


The Griffon and the Nightingale

by servantofclio



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games)
Genre: F/F, Morrigan - Freeform, Zevran - Freeform, and others - Freeform, occasional appearances by Alistair
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-05
Updated: 2019-04-07
Packaged: 2019-06-05 21:49:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 23
Words: 21,795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15180113
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/servantofclio/pseuds/servantofclio
Summary: Nimuë Amell never thought she'd leave the Circle, but somehow she ended up trying to save the world from the Blight. She never thought a sophisticated and beautiful bard would fall for her, either, but life is full of surprises.Moments and short fics following the DAO chronology.





	1. You've got it wrong (Nim and Duncan)

**Author's Note:**

> I started a fresh game of Dragon Age: Origins recently and started writing short fics to get to know my new character. I'm writing these as I play, for the most part, so these tend to fill in feelings and conversations around (this version of) the game events.

“You’ve got it wrong, you know,” Nim finally said the second day out from the tower, huddled under a damp cloak next to the fire.

“Hm?” Duncan said. “What have I got wrong?”

Nim flushed. They hadn’t spoken much in those two days. Duncan had answered her when spoken to, but seemed disinclined to start much conversation on his own, except to direct her away from stinging plants or to explain how to do something. He’d shown her how to lay the wood for a campfire, in a neat bundle, and had been trying to show her how to light it with flint and steel before she lost patience and lit it with a spark of mana instead. Fire had never been her strongest talent, but she could summon enough to light the carefully laid kindling. “Me,” she said. “I’m not that special.”

“That’s not what the First Enchanter said,” Duncan replied.

Nim shifted uncomfortably. Yes, she’d had lessons with the First Enchanter, but that wasn’t supposed to mean anything like _this_. Normally she tried hard not to be noticed. It seemed like the best way to get along in the tower: not be exceptionally skilled or exceptionally weak, not too troublesome or too much of a goody-goody. When the apprentices had lessons together, she’d paced herself so carefully, holding back sometimes so she was in the middle of the pack instead of first or second. Apparently she hadn’t quite succeeded.

She picked at the frayed spot on the cloak Duncan had given her. It was damp and muddy, like the rest of her. She’d had to heal herself of blisters four times already, and flyaway bits of hair kept coming out of her braids in the wind and drizzle. She’d held her tongue about this for two days, unsure if saying so might make Duncan send her back, and unsure if that would be better or worse than this. Irving might defend her. He certainly _ought_ to. After all, she’d only done what he asked. But Greagoir wasn’t pleased with her, so even if she went back, she’d be under extra templar scrutiny for the rest of her life.

It wasn’t fair. None of this seemed fair. She’d obeyed her First Enchanter, she’d tried to stay out of Jowan’s most disastrous scheme, but somehow she’d fallen into it anyway. She hadn’t succeeded at much of anything lately, it seemed, except her Harrowing.

Somewhere in the back of her mind, a little voice said that if Irving hadn’t been trying to score points off the templars in some sort of elaborate contest, she wouldn’t have been in this position. The voice felt like a stab, and Nim tugged her cloak closer around her. The plan had been at least half Lily’s, so Irving was right, she deserved to face the consequences, too.

“I know this is all new to you,” Duncan said, into the silence she’d failed to fill. “Rest assured, your skills are highly valuable to the Wardens.”

Nim swallowed down the thickness clogging her throat. “I hope I don’t disappoint.”

Duncan chuckled, a dry sound that startled Nim. She didn’t think she’d heard the man laugh before. “I’m sure you’ll rise to the occasion,” he said, and that was the end of their conversation for the night.


	2. Being a Grey Warden (Nim, Alistair, and Morrigan)

“I feel… stronger,” Nim whispered while they crouched in the grass, taking the first rest of their long trek toward the town of Lothering. They had been moving without rest for most of the day, and her legs only ached a little. She’d hardly been thinking about it now, when they’d finally paused to stuff some rations into their mouths, and the observation struck her as odd. “Is that something your mother did?”

Morrigan scrutinized her, dark eyebrows pulled together. “Mother mended your wounds. As I said before, I am no healer, but there is little she would have done to increase your strength.”

Alistair cleared his throat. “It’s, ah. It’s you getting more Warden-y.”

“What, the darkspawn taint?” Nim said, and only remembered when Alistair winced that that had been a secret she wasn’t meant to tell.

Morrigan smiled. “Do not fear. You Wardens’ use of darkspawn blood was not a mystery to me.”

“Wonderful,” Alistair muttered, and added more loudly, “So, well. That’s why.”

Nim stared at him. “You mean as the taint grows, we get… stronger? Hardier?”

“Tales of Grey Warden strength and endurance are legendary,” Morrigan said. She seemed to be enjoying herself.

“Better reflexes, too, mostly,” Alistair said, attempting to ignore her. “And you’ll have an astounding appetite. Terrible dreams, but at least the rest makes up for it? Kind of?” He shrugged and looked hopeful. “It’s why we can do what we do, to fight the darkspawn.”

Nim clenched her jaw, fighting down a surge of exasperation. It all made sense, suddenly: how she’d been able to make this trek cross-country, following Morrigan’s lead as they slipped through the Wilds, when only a few days previously she and Duncan had moved slowly down the road to Ostagar. Even some things back at the tower made sense. She’d shoved chunks of debris out of her path without thinking about it then, driven by the urgency of their mission, but she’d never lifted anything so heavy back at the Circle.

She’d changed; her very body had changed, absorbing that tainted blood. She was trying very hard not to think of it as blood magic. Duncan had said that Circle mages helped prepare the cup, so that meant whatever had been done wasn’t banned outright. “Is there anything _else_ I should know about the taint?” she demanded.

Alistair offered a sheepish smile. “If I think of anything, I’ll let you know?”

“Perhaps you ought not tarry for that,” Morrigan said dryly.

Alistair scowled at her. Morrigan smirked back. Nim sighed and hauled herself up to continue their journey.

 


	3. Personal questions (Nim and Leliana)

“How old are you, Leliana?”

The question popped out before Nim quite knew she was about to say it, as she watched Leliana’s profile in the light of the campfire. She’d been wondering for a while. At first she’d thought Leliana was around her age, maybe just a little older, but the more stories Leliana told about her life as a bard, the more Nim had had to push her guess upward.

Leliana laughed. “Old enough to know better than to ask a lady’s age.”

Mortified, Nim covered her face with her hands. “I am so sorry. I don’t know what came over me, it’s just... you’ve done so many things and been so many places, but you don’t look old at all…” Oh, Maker, what was she _saying_? “Please stop me from talking.”

Still laughing, Leliana reached over and pulled Nim’s hand away from her face. When Nim looked at her sidelong, Leliana was smiling, her eyes bright in the firelight. “It is true, I’ve been fortunate to travel a so much. The Maker has been kind to me, in a great many ways.”

Nim nodded, wishing that she were cleverer enough to come up with some kind of compliment. All she could think was _you have the smoothest creamiest skin I’ve ever seen_ , which seemed far too much and also entirely inadequate. Flirting wasn’t the sort of thing anyone was taught in the Circle. Leliana had grown up in Orlais, a much more sparkling sort of world. Nim was sure she’d sparkled among them, between her singing voice and her beauty.

“Besides,” Leliana added, “I learned long ago how to care of my face and my voice.” A shadow crossed her face and her eyes grew distant for a moment before she shook it off. “You can get the most marvelous creams, you know.”

“Oh,” Nim said. “No, I didn’t know.” She’d hardly ever seen cosmetics in the tower, either; only when a new teenage apprentice had brought some in with her.

Leliana clicked her tongue. “You poor thing, stuck in the Circle all your life.” She said it lightly enough that Nim couldn’t bristle at the sympathy, and added with glee, “When we get to a bigger town, we shall have to go shopping!”

“I’m sure we could use some supplies,” Nim said. They’d been doing well enough at trapping and gathering and sometimes bartering for bread and vegetables.

“No… well, yes, I suppose we could, but that’s not really _shopping_ ,” Leliana said. “I mean we could look at dresses and hats. And shoes.” She looked over the fire, starry-eyed.

“I… all right,” Nim said. She’d only ever had one pair a time.

“And face creams, and eye color.” Leliana turned back to Nim, her lips pursing as she looked over her face. “You’d look lovely in lavender, perhaps.”

Nim’s mouth went dry. “You really think so?”

“I do. But there is nothing like trying and seeing.” Leliana’s brows knit together. “Have you truly never tried such things? In Val Royeaux mages come to court sometimes, and they are beautifully turned out when they do.”

“No. The tower is far from anything else, in the middle of Lake Calenhad. A few of the senior enchanters go out sometimes. Maybe they go to court, but I don’t suppose Ferelden’s court is so splendid anyway.”

“No court is,” Leliana said. “How old were you, when you went to the tower?”

Nim looked at the ground. She didn’t want to see any trace of pity in Leliana’s eyes. “I must have been very small. I don’t really remember anything before.”

“Nothing at all?”

Nim shrugged, hunching her shoulders. Her memories of early childhood were so blurred and faded that she couldn’t be sure of anything. She had a fuzzy memory of a woman with dark hair and a soft voice – her mother, perhaps? And a louder voice, a man’s, and a vague memory of holding hands with another child. “Not much. Just… fragments. I know I didn’t come from Ferelden, though. My mother was from the Free Marches. I forget where.”

“My mother died when I was four years old,” Leliana said. “I remember her, but only a little.”

“Maybe I was two or three, then,” Nim said. “I think I remember crossing the sea – or a boat rocking in the waves, anyway – but I don’t know why I was sent here.” Sometimes mages were moved from one Circle to another because they wanted to study with a particular enchanter, or sometimes because of trouble at one Circle or the other. She’d also met one apprentice who had been moved to their Circle because she had a brother at her old Circle, but Nim didn’t know if that meant she had siblings somewhere she didn’t know about.

“It sounds very hard,” Leliana said.

“What, growing up in the Circle?” Nim shook her head. “It wasn’t all bad. The mages and Chantry sisters who worked with the youngest apprentices are good to us, mostly. I liked to learn, so I liked our lessons. I was… I wouldn’t have complained.” She took a deep breath. “But then again, I didn’t really know what I was missing.” She’d been overwhelmed when she first left the tower: sunlight seemed too harsh, the world around her too full of unfamiliar movements, colors, and noises. She’d startled at every rabbit fleeing through the scrub. Now, only a few weeks later, the tower already felt like half a lifetime ago.

Leliana was silent for a while. Nim dared a glance at her through her hair. To her relief, Leliana wasn’t looking at her as if she were some pathetic creature in need of tending. Rather, Leliana was looking toward the fire.

“I chose the cloister,” she said. “But it was a little like that, perhaps. A world unto itself, within the walls.”

“Yes,” Nim said with relief. “Are you sorry you left?”

“I had peace there for a time.” Leliana turned toward Nim then, her eyes warm. “But no. I would rather be here.”

Nim smiled, brushing her hair away from her face. “So would I.”

Leliana smiled back in a way that made Nim’s heart beat faster. She hoped the firelight hid the color coming to her cheeks.


	4. Into the tower

Nim’s heart sank as soon as she stepped into the tower, even before the heavy doors banged shut behind her.

The familiar curving corridor was silent, and smelled: of blood and meat, of smoke and ozone. She turned right to the first door out of old habit, but the room that greeted her was not the spare and tidy apprentice quarters she’d lived in her whole life, the bunks and chests neatly arrayed. Instead, it was wreckage: furniture overturned and smashed, shards of wood everywhere, spatters of blood on the floor. Stiff and trembling, she stood in the doorway for a long moment before she could make herself step across the threshold, to begin the methodical search for survivors or enemies.

She was glad she’d left Morrigan behind. She wasn’t sure she could bear one more word out of the wild witch’s mouth. The idea that the mages of the Circle deserved death – just for not fighting back! – made her stomach compress into a tight knot of anger. Did she even realize she was talking about Nim herself, as she’d been only a month ago? This tower had been home, as long as she could remember. Her home, her school, her space, no matter how confining. She had to believe that something, someone, here could be saved.

Wynne, at least, knew and shared Nim’s feeling. Without saying anything, she bent to look under a battered bunk bed to see if any of the younger apprentices might be hiding underneath. Alistair kept quiet, moving about the rubble, and Leliana restrained herself to sympathetic murmurs. Nim was grateful, though she felt as if their loaded gazes might be burning a hole in her back. Pity might shred her; she could not let herself collapse weeping now. She could not afford to give up, and she _would_ not let the pressing aura of fear and rage and grief take hold of her, transforming her into another wretched abomination.

The lingering sense of spirits pressing against the Veil was the same as they ascended to the higher levels, but it was easier for Nim to hold her emotions tight. She had never been in the templar quarters, barring the one time she’d been escorted to the Harrowing chamber at the top of the tower. That made the passage easier; she did not have to fight the clash between the carnage surrounding her and her memories of better times. But she did not relish the templars’ fate, any more than that of the mages, and averted her eyes from the crumpled armored bodies that lay on the floor, and from the streaks of blood on the walls.

Demons, here, too: lust, despair, and hatred churned in the air. She wondered if the others could feel it, too. Wynne certainly did, from the pinched look about her mouth. Alistair and Leliana looked tense and uneasy, but who would not, moving through this scene of butchery?

One foot in front of the other, she told herself. One step at a time, until they found the heart of this destruction and set things right.


	5. And out of the Fade (Nim and Leliana)

The last thing Nim would have expected was to miss the Fade.

It felt bizarre to admit that, even to herself. When she’d been sent to the Fade for her Harrowing, she’d been frightened and disoriented by the shifting landscape. Now she thought back on her more recent journey through the Fade wistfully. What made the difference? Perhaps it was simply because she’d spent more time there, when Sloth tried to trap them there? Or was it that she’d had to put fear aside, to escape Sloth’s clutches, and so had grown more open to the experience?

Whatever the reason, she’d become used to the malleability of the Fade. As they took the boat back across the lake and stepped out on the docks, she almost relished the way the boat shifted under her foot, and the land seemed disappointingly solid. Ordinary, not shimmering with potential. Her _body_ felt too solid, which was a stranger sensation than being in the Fade in the first place. She could no longer concentrate and see through spirit eyes, or ignite herself into a creature of flame, or reduce herself to the tiny mouse-form that had become so comfortable during her time in the Fade. She just _was_ , her body a fleshy thing that didn’t change no matter how much she willed it to.

She thought of Morrigan, and her talent for shape-changing, but after Morrigan’s harsh words about Circle mages, Nim was not ready to cast herself on Morrigan’s dubious mercy and ask for teaching.

“I am sorry about what happened in the tower,” Leliana said that night, approaching Nim where she sat by the fire.

“Hm?” Nim startled out of her reverie. She’d been gazing into the flames, half-focused, remembering being surrounded with fire, how the Fade-flames had licked at her fire-self and felt friendly, comfortable. “Oh. Thank you.” Her companions had been quiet since they’d all left the tower, perhaps caught up in their own memories of the Fade. “It’s hard to see my old home that way, but I’m glad more survived than we’d feared.” Many of the apprentices had hid, too insignificant for Uldred to try to win over. Nim regretted the loss of the older enchanters, but she had known very few of them well.

“Yes, at least something good came out of such wreckage.” Leliana sat down. “But I also meant to say, I am sorry about what happened with the sloth demon. I did not mean to… I feel that I should have seen it. That it was false.”

She had looped her arms around her knees and looked pensive, her mouth turned down. “There’s no reason you should have known,” Nim said. “You’re not a mage, and Sloth made its traps to suit.”

Leliana sighed. “I know, but… I should have known something wasn’t right. I felt so peaceful, but all the same…” She trailed off, looking more distressed than Nim could recall seeing her.

“Wynne was caught, too, and she’s far more experienced with Fade spirits and demons,” Nim pointed out, trying to offer some comfort.

“And when you came for me, I didn’t believe you,” Leliana said, frowning. “I am so sorry for that.”

Her eyes were shining, and Nim wanted very badly to wipe the furrow from her brow. She settled for putting her hand on Leliana’s arm. “It’s all right. Truly. I wasn’t offended.” Neither Leliana nor Alistair had believed her, and she could hardly blame them. They hadn’t known each other very long, and Sloth had been a powerful and persuasive demon, giving them exactly the peaceful, restful surroundings they had most wanted.

“I don’t know what we would have done without you,” Leliana said. “You saved us.”

The note of admiration in her voice made Nim’s cheeks burn. She ducked her head and started to turn away, but Leliana caught her hand before she could pull away entirely. “I would not have wanted this story to end with us sleeping away in Sloth’s domain while the world burned,” she said. “So thank you.”

“I just… did what had to be done,” Nim said.

Leliana smiled. “And so you did,” she said, with a little emphasis on _you_ that only encouraged Nim’s blush.

She straightened her shoulders, though, and squeezed back when Leliana squeezed her hand. It was true that after everything they’d been through, their mission seemed a little more possible now.

 


	6. Weakness (Nim and Morrigan)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Morrigan says some appalling things about Circle mages at the start of Broken Circle; I felt a need to have Nim address them.

“Morrigan, can I have a word with you?”

Morrigan glanced about at Nim’s approach, shot at a look at the rest of the group spread out on the road ahead of them. “’Tis as good a time as any, I suppose.”

“What you said at the tower.” It had taken a full two days for Nim to stop thinking about everything _else_ that had happened at the tower, and work up the courage to confront Morrigan. Even now, her stomach was working itself into knots. “Did you mean it?”

“I am not in the habit of saying things I do not mean,” Morrigan said, her tone just as lofty as usual.

Nim clenched her fists inside her sleeves. “That’s what I thought. But tell me, did you even realize you were talking about _me_?”

Morrigan raised her chin. “I was not speaking of you –”

Nim interrupted. “But you were. You were talking exactly about me. I am a Circle mage, Morrigan. I lived my whole life in that tower. I only left it a few weeks ago.”

Morrigan’s jaw tightened slightly, but she said, “Exactly. You took your chance to leave when you had it.”

“But I _didn’t_ ,” Nim said. “The Grey Wardens recruited me, and the First Enchanter pushed me to go. I wouldn’t have left on my own. Let me tell you, Morrigan, the thing I wanted most, growing up there, was to avoid being noticed. I didn’t want to stand out. I just wanted to be left alone with my books and have a few friends, if I could. I wasn’t rebellious, I wasn’t ambitious, I wasn’t trying to fight back or free myself. Do you think I deserved to die for that?”

Morrigan clearly recognized the trap, from the way her eyes narrowed. “You simply submitted to the will of the Chantry,” she said, as if she didn’t believe Nim.

“Yes, I did,” Nim replied. “Because it’s what I grew up with. There was another apprentice, older than I – he ran away all the time. But he never _escaped_. The templars always caught him and brought him back. One time they kept him away from the rest of us, for ages. They stopped letting the rest of us go outside as often, too. I didn’t want anything like that to happen to me. It was so much easier, just to go along.”

Morrigan said, “That is –”

“Weakness, I know you think that,” Nim said. She’d never interrupted anyone so much. Even though her stomach was still churning, she felt a hot little thrill of power at taking the reins of the conversation. “And you can think me weak if you want to.” She looked hard at the other woman’s face, but could not read the feeling behind the pursed lips and tight jaw. Do you know something else?” Nim said. “I still say it wasn’t all bad. It was quiet and peaceful, usually. I was bored a lot more often than I was afraid.”

“Shortsighed of you,” Morrigan said dryly.

Nim shrugged. “Maybe. I’ve learned a lot. I’ve had the chance to. And the mages we saved, they still might have the chance to learn. So you can think you know what it was like, and you can think Circle mages are weak, and you can think, ‘I’d never allow them to do that to me.’ And of course you wouldn’t, now. But you’re an adult, Morrigan. I was raised there. It’s all I knew. It’s all most of the apprentices know. You had Flemeth teaching you, and telling you that hiding from templars was a game, and we had templars and enchanters and Chantry sisters telling us to control ourselves and obey the templars. You haven’t lived it and you shouldn’t judge.”

A small, hard silence fell between them. In the distance, Nim heard Alistair’s voice rise in conversation, and Oscar barking. They had fallen a bit behind the vanguard of the group.

“I shall judge as I see fit,” Morrigan said at last, but her voice was quieter than usual. “But… perhaps I see your point.”

Nim let out a breath, some of her tension going with it. They walked on, the silence grown a shade more comfortable.


	7. Shopping (Nim and Leliana)

“Nim! Nimuë – this way, this way!” Leliana caught Nim’s arm and hustled her through Denerim’s bustling market square before she could say a word, or quite grasp where they were going.

“Leliana, what –” she managed to get out.

“Here, it is the most marvelous shop,” Leliana announced, and spoke to the woman at the stall in rapid Orlesian.

Nim looked around for the rest of her companions, and found only her dog, trotting along after them and wagging his tail. Shale had opted to remain outside the city, Alistair and Sten had gone off to look at armor, and Wynne had been purchasing supplies for potions. Morrigan had disappeared entirely, unless she had taken the form of the black cat Nim had spied slinking away into an alley.

“Nim,” Leliana said, “this is madame –”

“Just Liselle,” said the shopkeeper. “A pleasure. It is not often I meet such a knowledgeable customer.”

“Hello,” said Nim, feeling rather dazed and not in the least knowledgeable.

“She has the nicest Orlesian goods in Denerim,” Leliana said. “Creams, lotions, perfumes, ribbons… hm, what would look best in your hair?” She gathered up a fistful of variously colored ribbons from the stall and held them beside Nim’s face, eyes narrowed in scrutiny. “Hm. Do you think the green, or the blue?”

“Perhaps lavender?” Liselle suggested, producing another handful of ribbons from another shelf.

“Hm, yes, perhaps,” Leliana said. “Do you have that facial cream from the shop in Val Royeaux?”

“The Serene Moon? Of course.”

“I must have a jar, I’m beginning to run low. And what do you have for scents?”

“Oh, rose, certainly, jasmine, lily, gardenia…”

“Leliana,” Nim said desperately.

“Hm? Yes, Nim?” Leliana laid a piece of ribbon along Nim’s hair, winding it thoughtfully around her braid.

Nim swallowed and tried not to think too hard about how close Leliana was, or how her hands felt running through Nim’s hair. She concentrated instead on the meager state of the group’s purse, and how she’d sent some of the coin off with the others as they undertook their errands. “I don’t know if we can afford this sort of thing,” she whispered.

“Nonsense, a few comforts lift the spirits,” Leliana said. “We must keep up our morale, no? And she has perfumes and soaps. Just the thing to clean off the grime of travel.”

“Well… we do need soap…” Nim said. She eyed the bundle of ribbons wistfully.

“And scented oils,” Leliana said, with a particular tone to her voice that Nim wasn’t sure whether or not to read as flirtation. Her face grew warm anyway.

“What do you think?” Leliana put the ribbons down and took one of the little bottles that Liselle offered, deftly uncapped it, and put a drop on Nim’s wrist. “Jasmine and gardenia, I think. Mmm, that’s lovely.”

It did smell lovely; a garden of sweet floral scent seemed to spring to life out of the air, and Leliana bent to sniff, holding Nim’s wrist in her hand. Nim swallowed, watching Leliana’s hair fall against her neck.

“Soap,” she said. “We have to have that, at least. But perfumes and oils and things – aren’t they awfully expensive?” She had no real notion what such things cost, but if they came all the way from Orlais, they surely cost more than a few coppers.

“Leave that to me.” Leliana straightened. Her eyes seemed very blue as she stood, only a few inches away. “I have a little coin of my own, and the face cream is for me, anyway. But I was also thinking, you know… there are a lot of jobs for skilled people, in a place like Denerim.”

“Jobs?” Nim asked doubtfully. “What sort of jobs?”

Leliana shrugged, turning toward Liselle to make her purchases. “Many things that benefit from a little skilled help. A day or two won’t delay us much and could earn more than enough to keep us supplied and comfortable.”

Nim waited while Leliana bartered in Orlesian, then finally paid for a little bundle of jars and vials, and fell into step with her as she walked blithely across the square. “You mean like the Chanter’s Board?”

“Certainly,” Leliana said. “And we might stop in at a tavern or two.”

Nim frowned. “I don’t think I need to drink.”

“Not for that. Unless you want to,” Leliana said with a smile. “No, to hear the news. And that’s the sort of place to hear about jobs that, hm, aren’t strictly legal.”

Nim glanced around in alarm, but no one seemed to be paying attention to them. “Is that a good idea?”

“We are outlaws anyway, no?” Leliana said.

Strictly speaking, only Nim and Alistair were outlaws. She couldn’t help be grateful that Leliana was willing to count herself in that number. Nim blew out a breath. “I suppose, but…”

“But?”

“Isn’t that sort of thing a little… beneath us? We’re trying to stop the Blight.”

Leliana chuckled. “And we might stop it more easily with food in our bellies and weapons in our hands, surely. And for that we need coin in our pockets.”

“I suppose…” Nim said doubtfully.

She would wonder about these jobs again, as they surreptitiously disposed of shrouded bodies and fought off thugs in the alleys, but she definitely couldn’t argue with the satisfying weight of their purse as they left the city.

 


	8. Hope (Leliana)

Nimuë Amell was such a study in contrasts, Leliana couldn’t help but be fascinated. This was, after all, the woman who had walked into the tavern in Lothering and stunned a hardened band of soldiers with a flick of her fingers, who called lightning out of the air to devastate her foes, who faced conflict with a set jaw and steady resolve.

This was _also_ the woman who flustered at the most innocent teasing, and liked to hide behind the curtain of her long hair, and seemed bewildered when her companions deferred to her opinion.

She had been so confined in her tower that she seemed engrossed even by the mud they traipsed through on their way, but her manners were more than polite enough for any decent society.

Leliana stored up facts about Nim as a squirrel might hoard nuts:

She always introduced herself as Nimuë, her full given name, but somehow they’d all (excepting Sten and Shale) come to call her by the short-form without any of them quite remembering who’d started it.

She stood perhaps half a handspan taller than Leliana herself, which made her tall for a human woman, but still meant she was dwarfed by Alistair, Sten, and Shale.

People gravitated toward her anyway, whenever the group came to a new place.

She’d once spent half an evening on her knees in the mud watching little frogs hopping about by the creek.

She always made a face when she drank ale and tried to hide it. She had far more of a taste for mead.

She had tiny scars and calluses on her hands – odd ones, not in the places one might expect a person to hold a pen – which Leliana eventually realized came from conjuring fire and lightning.

No matter how tightly she braided her thick hair, she always had loose flyaway strands around her face by the end of the day.

She said she had never even seen a dog before leaving the Circle, but the mabari responded to her effortlessly.

In the sunlight, her hair was the rich amber color of honey.

Leliana was watching across the campsite while Nim talked to Morrigan about something – argued, even, perhaps – her hands were moving more than usual, and Leliana admired the graceful way they moved as she emphasized some point.

That was the moment she realized that the observations she’d been collecting came with warm feelings of a sort she hadn’t felt in some time.

Leliana looked down to gather herself. She had joined this quest on a thought and a prayer, unwilling to sit quietly in her cloister while the world burned. Camaraderie and friendship she had reasonably expected, but not this. After Marjolaine, she had guarded her poor battered heart more closely; she had admired the comeliest and kindest of the Chantry sisters and brothers, but nothing more.

She murmured a prayer under her breath, barely minding the words. The Maker could not have sent her for this, surely – but then again, who could know the Maker’s plan?

She looked up and saw Nim turn away from Morrigan, hands planted on her hips, her figure clearly outlined against the fields surrounding them, before she dropped her arms and started walking back toward the campfire Leliana tended.

Leliana recognized the delicate flutter of anticipation in her stomach then. How could she ever have mistaken it for anything else?

She rubbed her hands to warm them, watching Nim approach. She looked deep in thought, but when she saw Leliana, a smile broke over her face.

Leliana answered with a smile of her own, and let anticipation unfurl into hope.


	9. Choices (Nim & Leliana)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nim tries to explain about Jowan. (mentions of blood and blood magic)

“That mage, back at the castle,” Leliana said, leaving her question unspoken.

Nim could have played the fool and pretended Leliana meant Irving, or any of the other mages who had come to assist in the ritual, but she knew who Leliana meant. “Jowan.”

“Yes.” Leliana tilted her head slightly, gaze inquisitive. “You were friends?”

Her eyes were so very blue, and direct. Nim sighed, unable to quite meet their gaze. Thinking of Jowan felt like sitting on a bruise: there simply wasn’t any way to do it comfortably. “Yes.”

“I’m sorry, I don’t mean to pry,” Leliana said.

“No, it’s all right.” Perhaps it would help a little to talk about it. Alistair had asked, too – though he’d put it as: _“Um, how is it you’re friends with a blood mage?”_ Nim had explained, as best she could – she didn’t even think Alistair would judge her, truly – but he’d seemed a little close to the templar he’d almost been, just then, and she’d stumbled over her words.

“We grew up together,” she said to Leliana, the simplest start. “We were close in age – Jowan and I and a few other apprentices – so we were often together, at lessons or at play. We didn’t all get along, always, but, well.” She shrugged. “There we all were.”

“I see,” Leliana said softly.

“Jowan wasn’t the best student,” Nim said, and found that she didn’t quite know how to explain the things that other mages grasped so quickly. “He wasn’t quick at his lessons. He learned the theory, usually, but he was always a little… erratic. Our instructors always told us it was very important to have control. They didn’t want accidents.”

Leliana’s brows drew together. “You mean possession?”

Nim suppressed a shiver. “Not… well, yes. I don’t think they so much feared that of us children. They worried about errant fires, people getting hurt by accident. Magic can do a great deal of damage, even without attracting demons.” She shook her head. “Anyway. As we grew older, we had more individual lessons, so I didn’t see how Jowan was doing all the time. He often seemed discouraged, though, and he started worrying that he’d be made Tranquil.” She hesitated, casting Leliana a sidelong glance. “I don’t know if you know about the Rite.”

“I’ve heard of it,” Leliana said slowly. “And we met one such man at the tower, yes?”

“Owain.” Nim took a breath. “The Tranquil are severed from the Fade. Jowan fretted about it constantly. I tried to help him study, but it only seemed to help so much. Then the day after my Harrowing, he came to me. He wanted to run away, to flee the tower and start a new life. He’d fallen in love with one of the Chantry initiates. Lily.”

“Ooh,” Leliana said. “Forbidden love, how dramatic.”

Nim wrinkled her nose. “I’m still not sure how that happened. It’s not as if we spent a great deal of time with the initiates. I’m really not sure what they saw in each other, but they were going to run away together. Jowan wanted me to help them steal his phylactery so the templars couldn’t use it to track him.”

Leliana’s eyes widened. “What did you do?”

Nim bit her lip and ducked her head. “I went to the First Enchanter. I wouldn’t…” Her fingers tightened on the frayed hem of her sleeve. “I wouldn’t normally tell tales like that. There were plenty of other little things I’d covered up for. But this seemed too serious. Even if Jowan had the phylactery, the templars wouldn’t stop looking for him. Not after he ran off with an initiate. It was just… a wretched idea all around, but neither of them would listen to me when I tried to talk them out of it.” Lily had been worse than Jowan, if anything. Deep down, Nim hadn’t forgiven Lily for encouraging Jowan in this scheme, as if everything would have been all right without her encouragement.

“I suppose that was why he was angry with you,” Leliana said.

She spoke thoughtfully, with no judgment in her tone, but Nim flinched anyway. She still felt a wrench of guilt. “Yes. I don’t know. I’m… I suppose I was angry with him, too. It didn’t feel fair for him to ask me, when I was a newly made enchanter. I understand why he did, though.”

“How did the blood magic come into it, though?” Leliana was frowning. “If he knew blood magic, couldn’t he simply have used that in the first place?”

That sent a shiver down her spine. Could Jowan have controlled her, as Connor’s demon controlled the castle? Perhaps not; that might have been too much for him. “I don’t think so. Or maybe he just didn’t think of it. Only enchanters could access the storage where the phylacteries are kept. So he begged me, and I went to the First Enchanter, and I thought that would be the end of it. But Irving didn’t simply want to turn Jowan over to the templars. He wanted to make sure Jowan and Lily were both caught, so he told me to play along.” She shrugged, her shoulders feeling painfully tight. “I did as he asked. Jowan and Lily and I searched through the tower cellars until we found the phylactery. The templars were waiting when we came out. When they tried to take him, Jowan seized a dagger and slashed his own arm.” There had been so much blood – far more than it seemed there should have been, a shower of it hanging in the air like fat round rubies, burning away as Jowan used its power. Nim had seen a great deal of blood spilled since, but that moment still shone in her memory. “It seemed he’d been studying forbidden books in secret. Lily was horrified. Jowan fled. The Knight-Commander blamed me.”

“Did the First Enchanter not defend you?” Leliana asked, sounding indignant.

“He did. The Knight-Commander didn’t want to hear it. Then Duncan offered to take me for the Grey Wardens.” She looked up at the stars overhead. “So here I am.”

Nim said it lightly, trying to make the best of it, but Leliana, frowning, shook her head.

“That’s horrible. Neither of them was truly a friend to you, to use you as a tool that way.”

“I don’t think…” Nim stopped, swallowed, and tried again. “Jowan just… doesn’t think things through, and I think he was more worried about himself. I’d never gotten into trouble. He probably assumed I’d be all right, no matter what. The First Enchanter… I don’t know. It was always hard to tell what he was thinking. Maybe he intended me to join the Wardens all along. Maybe he thought I needed a push. I don’t know.”

“Still,” Leliana said after a moment. “It was a sorry thing, to leave you no choice.”

Nim looked up at the stars. Leliana had shifted closer; with just a few inches of movement herself, their shoulders would touch. Her skin prickled at the thought. “I might have been too afraid to leave. And I’m not sorry I did.”

Leliana reached over and touched Nim’s hand. “I’m not sorry you did, either.”

Nim turned her hand palm up and let Leliana lace their fingers together.


	10. Hopeless (Nim and Zevran)

“I have noticed,” Zevran said, “that you have eyes for our lovely bard.”

Nim, caught in the midst of sampling the stew Zev was preparing for dinner, choked on her mouthfull and stared at him in panic. Was she that obvious? “What? Did I – do you – has anyone else noticed?”

“Oho! My guess strikes true.”

Nim swallowed and hurled a crust of bread at him, indignant. “That was a trap! You made me give myself away!”

He quirked an eyebrow and smirked at her, nonchalant. “Such are an assassin’s skills.”

“You’re awful,” Nim grumbled. Zevran merely laughed at her as she slumped in place by the fire, hunching her shoulders. Somewhere along the way, it had gotten easy to talk to him. Alistair had been dubious about recruiting an assassin into their midst, and Nim had worried, too, but as she’d talked to Zevran, she’d found him not only clever and witty, but shockingly honest and straightforward. He kept his word, and he listened to her without judgment, which was refreshing considering how opinionated most of the others were.

She dared count Zevran a friend, these days, regardless of the circumstances of their meeting.

“I am merely observant, my dear Warden,” he said, stirring. “Is there some reason you wish no one else to notice?”

“it’s just…” Nim’s hands fluttered helplessly. “It’s hopeless, is all, I don’t want to hear any jokes or jibes about it.

“Hopeless?” Zev clicked his tongue. “Now why should you think such a thing?”

Nim cast a dubious glance in his direction. “She’s just so…” She spread her hands and dropped them to her sides. “She’s brilliant and beautiful. She’s so talented.”

“She does have a lovely voice,” Zevran said, helping not at all.

“She’s older than I am,” Nim went on. She’d counted up all the reasons any thought of Leliana seemed impossible over and over again, lying awake and staring at the stars, or the canvas of her tent.

“Not by so very much, surely.”

“But she’s actually been places and seen things, and I spent my whole life in the tower before I became a Warden.”

“You are seeing things now, surely.”

Nim shook her head, waving her hands at the damp Fereldan countryside around them. “She’s _Orlesian_. She’s been to court, she’s lived in Val Royeaux. She’s had so much finer things in her life than anything I’ve ever seen. She’s definitely kissed more people than I have.”

“Well, on that point I could assist you.”

Nim sighed. “Thank you, Zev, but no thank you.”

“Merely a suggestion,” he said cheerfully.

Kissing Zev would doubtless be instructive, as she had no doubt he’d kissed a lot more people than she had, too. But she didn’t _want_ to kiss other people.

She had to assume that Leliana had done many other things as well, especially given what Leliana had said about Marjolaine. Even imagining what Leliana – a bard, a spy, gifted and sophisticated – must know about made her cheeks burn. Nim herself had only managed to exchange some fumbling kisses with other apprentices in quiet corners, out of view of nosy templars. Nothing serious. Nothing _real_.

“She’s just so much more experienced,” she said gloomily. “I don’t know… I can’t imagine what she’d see in me.”

Zevran chuckled.

“What?” Nim asked.

“I think you may underestimate your charms,” he said, laughing.

Nim squinted at him sideways. “I don’t need you to flatter me.”

“Not at all! My dear Warden, you are a lovely and formidable woman. And if I may, experience has its points, but does not weigh more than enthusiasm and affection.”

His tone had grown darker, and when Nim looked at him again, he wore a more serious expression, frowning slightly into the stew pot. “Zev?” she asked cautiously.

He shook his head. “No matter,” he said, and she knew that whatever story lay behind that look, she wouldn’t hear it tonight. “Leliana clearly thinks highly of you,” he continued briskly. “And perhaps more! Who can tell? You will have to talk with her to find out.”

“Andraste have mercy,” Nim groaned.

Zevran only laughed at her, because he was awful like that.


	11. On a peaceful night (Nim and Leliana)

Leliana said, “I enjoy the nights at camp. The night always seems more peaceful to me. Safer.”

“I know what you mean,” Nim said, leaning back on her hands to look up at the stars. She knew their enemies were still out there, but there was something comforting about the warmth of the camp around them, all the same. The campfire crackled with warmth, and everyone’s tents gathered around it. Tonight, everyone had separated off to their homely tasks of mending and washing and cleaning weapons. It rested the spirit and made Nim feel at home, even though they were on the road.

“I feel like the night grants us a reprieve from the troubles of the day,” Leliana said.

“Mm.” Nim nodded assent. The two of them had settled a little ways from the fire; Nim had been cleaning her boots while Leliana fletched some arrows.

Strictly speaking, Nim had taken a good deal longer than necessary to clean her boots, just to stay in Leliana’s company.

Leliana laughed quietly. “Silly, isn’t it? The darkspawn never sleep, and they lurk in the shadows.”

Nim suppressed a shudder. If she let herself think things like that, the velvety darkness seemed a good deal less safe. “Ugh, don’t say that. It’s not silly to try to lay down your burdens.”

“Mm, I suppose not,” Leliana said. “You know, I especially enjoy those nights when we stand watch together, talking to pass the time in those small hours. Well… I talk and you listen.”

“I like hearing you tell stories,” Nim said, and immediately bit her tongue. She loved listening to Leliana, whether she was spinning tales out of legend or talking about her adventures as a bard. The rise and fall of her voice was always smooth and melodic, even without her actually singing.

Leliana smiled. “Sometimes I even succumb to sleep, and wake to find you still watchful. And I know you’re watching out for me.”

Nim shrugged awkwardly, the back of her neck growing warm. “You never have to feel afraid with me. I mean, sometimes I doze off, too...” She trailed off.

Leliana leaned forward, her eyes bright and earnest. “What I am trying to say is that I trust you. I am comfortable around you. I know that you will be there when I need you. You are our leader, and my friend, and sometimes… I think that we could be more than that. Maker, look at me, stumbling over my words like an ill-educated peasant girl. Some bard I am...”

Nim stared at her, stunned silent. Friends, yes; she’d treasured her friendship with Leliana, hugging every conversation and friendly touch to her like a favorite blanket. But… more? Leliana thought… that? Leliana had said that, and was pink-cheeked now, teeth pressed into her lip, darting looks at Nim through her eyelashes?

“Are… are you nervous?” Nim blurted. Realizing her mouth had been hanging half-open, she shut it hard enough to make her teeth click.

“I’m not!” Leliana protested. “I’m just flushed because of the… heat.”

They weren’t that close to the fire, and the night was cool around them. Nim almost made these objections, but stopped herself. She wasn’t _that_ foolish, and she couldn’t leave Leliana hanging like that, not when Leliana had spoken words that made her heart race. “I… I’ve always wanted us to be more than friends,” she admitted.

“Really?” Leliana sounded utterly astounded. “You felt the same way and you didn’t do the courtesy of informing me? Y- you let me say all those things! Why couldn’t you have said them first?”

Nim winced, momentarily afraid her shyness had led her into an awful mistake. “I didn’t think you felt that way.”

“So we were both waiting,” Leliana said. “Oh, how very awkward.”

Nim swallowed, searching for some words that would make things right. She twisted to face Leliana. “I’m glad you said something.”

Leliana’s frown faded away. “Well, I shouldn’t be a baby about it, then, should I? I suppose someone had to speak first.” She laughed a little and shook her head. “I must be a sight, spilling my guts like that.”

Her eyes sparkled as she looked at Nim. She _was_ a sight, always, but not anything embarrassing at all. Her heart hammering in her chest, Nim took a deep breath and leaned forward. She hesitated for a bare second, meeting Leliana’s eyes, but found only encouragement, and pressed her mouth to Leliana’s.

Her lips were so soft and she kissed Nim back at once, with no hesitation or fumbling; Leliana tilted her head to find a better angle, their lips slid against each other as if they belonged together. This close, Leliana’s hair brushed across Nim’s cheek, and the sweet floral fragrance she wore filled Nim’s senses. Nim closed her eyes, a thrill racing through her body, and pulled back a fraction of an inch, her lips parting. Leliana’s fingers slipped across her cheek, and then back into her hair, cradling her head and renewing the kiss – deeper, warmer, her tongue brushed against Nim’s open lips, a little tease that made Nim shiver. She reached out herself, shyly, putting her hand on Leliana’s shoulder and sliding it up the back of her neck. Maker, she’d thought more than was reasonable about the soft skin on Leliana’s neck.

Leliana made a soft muffled noise and leaned closer, kissing harder, and Nim’s mouth fell open, Leliana’s tongue slick against hers, filling her mouth as if she could taste all the feelings Nim had been bottling up for weeks. Nim kissed Leliana back, open-mouthed, and warmth spread through her chest and down her spine and right down into her toes and fingers, and when they finally parted for breath, she felt incandescent, light in every limb.

She blinked, dazzled, as Leliana smiled back at her, her eyes heavy-lidded. “Well,” Leliana said, her voice low. “Hmm.” Her full lips pursed, flushed pink. “That settles it, then.”

“It does?” Nim asked, breathlessly.

“Most certainly.” Leliana leaned forward and gave Nim a quick, soft kiss on the corner of her mouth. “More than friends it is. Don’t you think?” Her lips moved sideways, planting light kisses across Nim’s cheek, and along her jaw.

“Oh,” Nim said, and wrapped her other arm around Leliana as well. “Yes. Definitely.”

There were a great many more kisses – before, Nim could have counted all the kisses she’d had in her life on her two hands, but she rapidly lost count. She kissed Leliana’s neck, too, like she’d dreamed of, down the smooth line of her throat. Leliana squeaked when she did, which filled her with satisfaction so that she was fit to burst. She fell back against the ground and Leliana went with her, her arms around Nim, Nim’s fingers combing through Leliana’s hair.

She had no idea how long they went on before Leliana pulled away abruptly and sat up, fiddling with something on her sleeve. Nim sat up, too, blinking, cold in the sudden shock of Leliana’s absence. Only then did she register the approaching footsteps of their companions, whose existence she had briefly but utterly forgotten. Her cheeks heated, and she shook her hair across her face to hide her flush. Leliana answered Alistair’s greeting in a perfectly ordinary way. Her voice was calm and cheerful, betraying nothing of their recent activities. Nim, unsure that she could do anything other than giggle or stammer, envied her composure. She breathed in and out, slowly, trying to regain a sense of calm and quell the fluttering excitement inside her. She only waved as Sten and Zevran and Wynne trooped up as well, for a last rest by the warmth of the fire before they turned in for the night.

 _Later_ , she thought, watching Leliana, who seemed to be talking effortlessly. _We can find more time alone… later._

Leliana glanced at her, as if she’d heard the thought, and sent a half smile Nim’s way. Nim smiled back, her heart quickening, and settled down to wait.


	12. In too deep (Nim and Leliana)

Usually Nim found it calming to talk to Wynne, but this time, she walked away with her thoughts churning, so distracted that she nearly tripped over a rock and altogether failed to notice when Leliana herself caught up with her.

“Whatever is the matter?” Leliana asked. “You look troubled.”

Nim startled, guilty, and glanced over her shoulder toward Wynne, who now sat reading placidly. “Do I? It’s… probably not important.”

“No?” Leliana followed the line of Nim’s glance. “Is Wynne all right? She seemed tired today.”

“Yes… I mean, she did, but I’m sure she’s quite all right. It’s not that.”

“No? Then what?”

Nim bit her lip. She hadn’t meant to mention any of what Wynne had said until she had a chance to think it over by herself. But with Leliana right there, frowning in concern, her resolve slipped away. She cast a quick glance about, but they stood on the edge of the campsite, with none of the others close at hand. “Wynne gave me some advice that I… suppose have to think about.”

Leliana tilted her head, quizzical. “So serious. Something about magic, I suppose.” The corner of her mouth turned up.

“Ah… no.” Nim looked around at the trees, crossing her arms and tugging at her sleeves. “It was about us.”

“You mean, about you and me?” Leliana asked. Her smile fell away as her posture straightened. “Oh, indeed. Should I be concerned as well?”

“She just said she was worried.” Nim pressed her tongue against her teeth. “She noticed, um, how we’ve been, and she’s afraid we might get hurt.”

“We might get hurt at any time,” Leliana said, her voice calm and even. “We walk among great risks.”

“Yes, that’s just it.” Nim tore her gaze away from the dark trees above to meet Leliana’s eyes, so blue and clear that her heart twinged. “Our mission is the most important thing.”

“Of course it is,” Leliana said. She was frowning, but she sounded so reasonable that all the worries Wynne’s speech had planted in Nim’s head shriveled a little. “We must defeat the Blight, for the sake of Ferelden and all Thedas. We all understand that, I think?”

“Yes,” Nim said, relieved. “I think Wynne’s worried that if one of us were badly hurt, or killed –” Her voice didn’t shake. She was proud of that. They had come close a time or two. Somehow, by the Maker’s grace, they had escaped so far. “—that it would be too hard for the other to continue.”

Leliana was quiet for a second, turning her face away. Her hair fell in an elegant line across her cheek.

“I see. Of course it would be terrible,” Leliana said softly. “But that is no reason to make ourselves suffer by forcing ourselves apart.” She turned back to Nim, brushing her hair out of her face. “Unless perhaps you disagree.”

“No,” Nim said quickly. Her fingers tightened against her arms as Leliana’s words sank in. “No, you’re right. I feel stronger with you, and… more hopeful, and that makes it easier to go on.” The words clarified her feeling in an instant, like clear fluid separating from sediment in a potion. The thought of walking down the road beside Leliana and trying to stay cool, separate, and stoic – not looking at her, admiring the way she moved, loving her – made her feel like her heart was withering in her chest.

Leliana’s lips quirked. “Well then,” she said. “it seems we agree.”

Nim nodded. Wynne might worry all she liked, but it was, perhaps, already too late for what she feared. “It’s like you said before, the Maker gives us many blessings.”

Leliana smiled, her eyes dropping half-closed, soft and alluring. “Am I a blessing of the Maker, then?”

“Oh yes,” Nim breathed, her heart somewhere in her throat.

“I am glad you think so, because you are certainly one yourself.”

Kissing Leliana was still a novelty that made Nim’s heart race. Her lips were so soft as they pressed against Nim’s, the scent of her skin and hair wrapped around Nim like a cloud, and Nim felt as though she might burst, or fly, or shatter into a thousand fragments. She put up a hand to touch Leliana’s cheek, so smooth against her fingertips, and put the other arm around Leliana’s shoulders. Leliana sighed a little against her lips and leaned closer, brushing Nim’s unruly locks away from her face. Nim felt half-drunk when they parted, only an inch, and she gazed helplessly into Leliana’s smiling eyes.

“And we should definitely enjoy the Maker’s blessings,” she said, breathless.

She had a moment’s embarrassment that she might sound utterly inane, but Leliana laughed, low and warm. “We definitely should,” she agreed, and pressed another soft kiss to Nim’s mouth.


	13. Mirror (Nim and Morrigan)

Nim couldn’t stop thinking about Morrigan’s story. Morrigan had insisted that Flemeth was right to destory the pretty mirror she’d stolen as a child, but the act seemed harsh to Nim, and the tale still troubled her.

Maybe it was that every other story Morrigan had told about her childhood seemed so much happier: playing in the woods, talking with animals, learning her magic freely and confidently. Even her talk of hiding from the templars had been framed as a game of hide-and-seek. Nim had been… a little envious, if truth be told. A tiny jealous, wistful longing deep downwhere it need not be talked about. Morrigan’s childhood had sounded so much freer and more joyful than her own. More isolated and a little lonely, perhaps. Nim had been surrounded by fellow apprentices, older enchanters, and templars and Chantry folk her whole life. But Morrigan had been able to run free and grow and know her own mind and strengths, and had even crept off to the town of Lothering to see other people now and then. She had not had to watch other apprentices be punished, or panic in the face of what they could do, and she had not had to obey so many elders, and she had not had to be so careful and controlled, so that she didn’t seem dangerous nor exceptional.

Even now, that need for control tightened Nim’s chest and made her wary of the magical energies she could feel surrounding her. They were just within reach, but she didn’t reach for them; no sparks should fly from her fingers, nothing should freeze or stiffen around her.

Nothing _needed_ to, she told herself irritably. Her magic would be there when she needed it.

And in the meantime, there was Morrigan, always loftily certain that she had the right, practical way of it. The story of the mirror told Nim, at least, that Morrigan’s childhood was not quite the wild witchly paradise she’d been imagining. Perhaps Flemeth had been harsher, or stricter about certain things, than Morrigan had let on before.

She shouldn’t be surprised, really. No one had it easy. She glanced over her shoulder at her companions. Alistair had slept in stables, Zevran had been bought as a child (and was proud of the price, Maker help them both), Shale had been bossed about by old Wilhelm, Leliana had been betrayed. Sten didn’t talk about his past much, but from his demeanor, Nim could not imagine it had been all sunshine and games. Even Oscar had been terribly ill when Nim first met him, though you wouldn’t know it to see him now, gamboling down the road. She wondered if Morrigan, who liked to keep herself apart, even realized how much everyone had already been through.

The story of the mirror explained so much, really. Some time ago, when it had just been Nim and Alistair and Morrigan and Oscar, they had found a bit of silver jewelry in a bandit’s pouch. Nim had taken it, gingerly, feeling sorry for whoever the original owner had been, and had turned to find Morrigan watching her, something sharp in her golden eyes.

“I found this,” Nim had said. She held it up, and saw how the chain glinted in the afternoon sunlight, and how Morrigan’s eyes followed the sway of the pendant. “Do you… er, do you want it?”

Morrigan’s eyes had narrowed as she turned away. “No. Sell it. The coin will be of far greater use.”

“All right,” Nim had said, pocketing the necklace, but the exchange had stuck with her.

Now Morrigan was walking alongside Leliana, who seemed to be talking about something. Shoes and dresses, perhaps, from the effusive look on her face and the occasional words that drifted to Nim’s ears. Morrigan shook her head from time to time, her mouth shut tight, but she listened all the same.

Perhaps the next time they found something pretty, Nim would insist that Morrigan take it. They weren’t hurting quite so much for coin these days. They could spare a necklace or ring or two.


	14. Cold (Nim and Leliana)

All around them was chaos: searing flame, screaming, the clash of steel on steel. Leliana nocked and fired and drew another arrow, too quickly for real thought, except that… there were too many cultists, springing out from behind closed doors. They had been waiting. A knot of ice tightened between her shoulder blades, and she darted a glance behind, at the yawning darkness of the ancient temple corridor.

No berserkers appeared to ambush them from behind. She turned back to the fray and looked for Nim. She had been a little ahead when their enemies burst upon them, so where…?

She was _still_ ahead, Leliana saw in a moment; ahead and a little separate, gripping her staff in both hands as she faced off with a bearded, robed man. Leliana took aim just as Nim stiffened and fell in a cloud of white sparks that flew from the man’s hands.

“Nim!” Her name broke from Leliana’s throat as she let the arrow fly, straight into the enemy mage’s throat. He toppled – slowly, everything seemed slow now. A knot of struggling warriors separated her from Nim’s fallen body, and Leliana’s fingers fumbled as they sought another arrow. She blinked wetness out of her eyes and drew again, loosed the arrow at one yelling, fur-clad man. He fell, and the man beside him fell to Zevran’s daggers, and Alistair knocked down a third, and at last, at last, she could run past her companions, her heart thundering in her ears, and drop to her knees at Nim’s side.

She lay, covered in a sheet of frost, as still as any marble effigy. Leliana sought the pulse-point in her throat with one hand, and with the other scrambled at her own belt-pouch, seeking a vial of healing fluid. Her hands shook too much to be of any use; she could not be certain whether or not she felt any motion beneath the skin, and she could not find the right vial among the poisons and poultices she carried.

Wynne brushed past her without a word, crouching to lay a hand on Nim’s forehead. She murmured something Leliana could not make out, and a wave of gentle heat washed over them both. Under Leliana’s fingers, a heartbeat jumped to life, and Nim sucked in a great breath, eyes flying wide.

Leliana heaved a breath herself, half a sob, and sank back onto her heels, her shoulders sagging. Her heart still hammered in her chest. Maker, what was wrong with her? Nim had been hurt before – every one of them had been hurt before – but something felt different. Leliana’s nerves thrummed like plucked strings, and her heart threatened to leap into her throat. She cast a fearful glance around. The cultist they had slain lay in bloody heaps around them, and beyond, the wind whistled through the temple’s dark, cavernous halls.

This place unsettled her. Not only were they seeking the legendary Urn of Sacred Ashes, lost for so many ages that it seemed pure legend, but the cultists talked of Andraste as if she were alive.

More than that, even – it felt as though there was something wrong with the place itself. The cold was bitter enough to sink into their leathers and make their breath come out in puffs, stiffening Leliana’s fingers. This building was ancient, far older than the faux rustic Chantry they’d found when they entered the village of Haven. Leliana had seen Tevinter ruins before; both Orlais and Ferelden had their share, centuries-old imperial grandeur. Everything here seemed older even than those roads and villas. The temple yawned around them, vast and broken and old, as if it would swallow them up. She felt as though eyes watched every step they took from the shadows. It made everything seem more dangerous.

Nim coughed and tried to sit up, curling flakes of frost dropping off her hair and robe. Wynne supported her from behind, into a half-sitting position. Silently, Leliana reached for her. A poor bard she made, with no loving words to greet her dear one, but the oppressive bulk of the temple seemed to freeze her tongue in her throat.

Perhaps Nim understood her silence; at least, her arms curled around Leliana tightly as Leliana gripped her back. She pressed her cheek to Nim’s, not wanting to interfere with the gasping breaths Nim drew. They eased in a few moments, breath coming more steadily and quietly. Leliana turned her head to kiss Nim just below her eye. Nim turned to kiss her back, a clumsy attempt that landed on Leliana’s jawline. Her lips were still cold.

To Leliana’s surprise, Wynne squeezed her shoulder as well as Nim’s and retreated, leaving the two of them alone for a few minutes. Leliana simply held on while Nim caught her breath. It would be all right, she told herself, over the still-rapid beating of her heart. This temple and its secrets would not yet eat them alive.


	15. Faith (Nim and Leliana)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leliana is shaken at the Temple of Sacred Ashes.

The… the _audacity_. Leliana closed her trembling hands into fists. Guardian spirit, or — _whatever_ it might be, it clearly understood nothing. It certainly did not understand her. Spinning lies or fancies or wild guesses, or… or who knew what.

But not truth. No. The Maker’s touch, the Maker’s gifts, were all around them, in the beauty of the world and of life. Others didn’t see that only because they chose not to. She wasn’t making it up. She wasn’t trying to gain attention or set herself above the other sisters, or anything like that.

Even as she thought it, she felt shaken with the charge, her heart thrumming in her chest like a bird. The gentle peace of the Chantry cloister felt far out of reach, as she searched her memory. _Was_ it true? _Had_ she puffed herself up? The Revered Mother had warned her about such things, and she had always denied it. She’d bowed her head and sung her penitential prayers without complaint, but now she thought back, seizing upon every selfish thrill of satisfaction when the other sisters had murmured or whispered or glanced at her in dubious awe. Oh, Maker…

A prayer for Andraste’s mercy came to her lips, old and rote but springing from her heart nonetheless. Oh, what sort of person was she, who had sung everywhere from crowded taverns to elegant salons, but could not simply join her voice to a Chantry choir. Could she truly not bear the dreariness of being ordinary?

“Leliana?” Nim touched her arm, and Leliana blinked, forcing herself back to her surroundings.

“Yes?” she said, tight and breathless.

“Are you…” Nim hesitated. “Do you need a moment?”

“No. I…” Leliana shook herself. Trials lay before them, and beyond that, the urn, blessed Andraste’s own remains, if legend spoke true. So much death and struggle lay behind them already, just to get to this point. “Let’s not delay.”

“I thought it was…” Nim glanced back over her shoulder, the way they had come. “It seemed unkind, what the spirit said to you.”

“You heard,” Leliana said in a small voice. Of course she’d heard. What nonsense. They all had, hadn’t they? The rest were just pretending they hadn’t heard the spirit’s judgment.

“I did,” Nim admitted, and added in a rush: “I think it’s wrong, though. It’s only a spirit, it’s been here for centuries, they don’t understand mortals very well.”

“That’s… kind of you to say.” Leliana swallowed. “I’m not so sure.” It felt like chewing rocks to admit it, even in a whisper.

“ _I’m_ sure.” Nim squeezed her arm, dipping her head to look Leliana in the eye. “You told me the Maker had a plan for us, and I believe it. Else, how should we have found this place, after all this time?”

The question hung in the air of the ancient shrine, cold and untouched for age upon age. Leliana took a breath, and tried to a let a little calm creep back into her heart. She touched the Andraste medallion she wore at her throat – a gift from Nim, weeks past.

A test, then. A trial of her faith. That is how she would look at this moment. They shored each other up, in their darkest moments, and surely that was a blessing from the Maker, too. So it must have been for Andraste and her faithful companions. “Yes,” she said, and cleared her throat. “We are so close. Let us go on.”

Nim peered into Leliana’s face for a moment and then nodded, giving her arm one last squeeze before turning to face the trials ahead.


	16. Unexpected (Nim and Dagna)

Nim stared at the young dwarf in astonishment. None of the other dwarves she’d encountered had known the first thing about magic. Indeed, those who had recognized her for a mage had given her a wary eye. The last thing she would have expected to find in Orzammar was a dwarf who could name Tevinter tones of magic – much less one who wanted to go to the Circle.

“Have you actually read that book?” Nim said in surprise.

The young woman nodded, smiling broadly. “It’s a fascinating text. I’d really like to be able to compare Tevinter to southern magical theory. I’ve already read the lectures of the Enchanter Wenselus, but that’s, hm, kind of introductory, isn’t it?”

“I… well, yes, they start us on it as apprentices,” Nim said, bemused.

“It was really helpful to read at first, of course, just to see what foundational theory you start with.”

“How did you even get these books?” Nim asked. Dagna was far too… too cute, round and snub-nosed and pig-tailed, to be so interested in spirit and necromancy.

“Orzammar trades with the Imperium,” Dagna reminded her cheerfully. “I just put the word out to a few traders what I was looking for. Anything about magic, honestly. I’ll read whatever I can find. It’s better, don’t you think? To learn as much as possible?”

“Of course,” Nim said, without even thinking about it. “There’s a great deal of Tevinter lore we don’t read in the south, though. Not much that’s new. Everything from Tevinter has to be carefully vetted before it’s released to the Circles. Especially to the apprentices.”

Dagna nodded vigorously. “I suppose you really only get the dominant school of thought, don’t you? That’s such a shame.”

“There are differences of opinion even within a single Circle. You might be surprised how much debate there can be.”

Dagna’s smile widened. “Oh, I really want to hear it.”

“My own teachers had a number of disagreements…” Nim glanced over her shoulder and winced to see the rest of her party visibly fidgeting. Of course… well, of course they were less enthralled with a discussion of debates on magical theory than she herself was. If only they hadn’t just come from the market stalls, she could have contrived to send them on errands while she and Dagna talked. But as it was, they were wanted in the Diamond Quarter, and she supposed they mustn’t keep the nobles waiting. “… perhaps I can tell you about them another time.”

“I’d like that! I’m sure you must be very busy, though.”

“Yes,” Nim said with a sigh, and shook herself. “Where might I find you later?”

“Well, if I’m not here, you can ask for me at my father’s shop.” Dagna gestured toward the smithy they’d visited not an hour before. Her expression grew serious. “Though… please don’t tell him why you’re looking for me. He’s, ah… not keen on my studies.”

“Oh,” Nim said, taking in the sudden droop of Dagna’s mouth and shoulders. A vast, warm indignation rose up in her, and she resolved at once that Dagna should have a place at the Circle if she liked, even if Nim had to bribe Irving for it. “I shall bear that in mind. And I shall certainly speak to the First Enchanter.”

Dagna perked up at once. “Will you? Oh, that would be wonderful! I’ll keep my bags packed!”

“It may take a little time,” Nim said. “It’ll take time to get to the Circle and back, and I have things to do here first…”

“That’s all right!” Dagna clasped her hands together. “I just want to be ready to go as soon as – oh, I’m so excited! Thank you!”

“It’s entirely my pleasure,” Nim said, with feeling. How much Dagna could learn at the Circle – and how much a new perspective might shake the Circle up, for the better.


	17. Undecided (Nim and ensemble)

“I just don’t know,” Nim said quietly, into the gathered circle of her companions.

Around them, Orzammar bustled. The shouts of the dwarven criers rang out through the high stone passages. Nim had marveled, at first, at the grandeur of Orzammar’s halls, cut out of solid stone and far higher than any dwarf could ever need. She had seen dwarven craftsmanship on the surface, but it was nothing to the fineness of the precisely cut work here behind the city’s great wrought gates.

But now she sweated, the rivers of molten rock that flowed through the city rendering the air stifling and sulfurous. In the short time they’d been here, she’d learned to see the heaps of dust in corners, the pinched look on too many broad dwarven faces.

She held letters in her hand, promissory notes that Vartag Gavorn swore were evidence of double-dealing, and it seemed her lot to choose between the contenders for the throne.

“Both of them just want to use us,” she murmured, too conscious of the avid, suspicious looks of passing dwarven nobles. Everything they did here sent signals. Merely being seen talking to Gavorn, or to Harrowmont’s man who’d also asked a favor, sent a message.

“Exactly,” Zevran said. “We are but tools in their contest against each other. The question is, from which can we get the best advantage?”

“Harrowmont seems an honorable sort,” Alistair said uncertainly. “This Proving – I don’t know much about it, but an honorable combat…”

Nim shook her head. “How honorable is it, when none of them have a mage on their side? I don’t know if I like it. I certainly don’t want to have to harm… or kill… worthy opponents for sport.”

Alistair grimaced and nodded, chewing on his lip.

“I think that the Proving serves two purposes,” Leliana said slowly. “It forces us to stand for Harrowmont, publicly, and it also allows him to take our measure. If he does not like what he sees, he may find some means of putting off our request.”

Nim winced at that thought. “We can’t leave here without the dwarves’ support. If we won’t get it, we might as well turn around and leave right now, and save ourselves the effort.” They had no idea what was happening on the surface. Every hour they were here, their enemies might be overrunning more towns.

Zevran turned his head and spat. “I’ll say it again: we should not back a coward who hides behind others.”

“Aren’t you a hired assassin?” Alistair asked.

Zevran grinned at him. “I never said I respected my employers, my friend.”

“All right, all right,” Nim said. “But how is Bhelen better? He wants us to do his dirty work, too.”

Zevran shrugged one shoulder and dipped his head, acknowledging that.

“If the rumors are true, he’s all mixed up in his brother’s murder, even though the other sibling was blamed for it.” Subtle as sin, Lord Helmi had said. Nim frowned at the letters in her hand. The task seemed simple enough – righteous, even, if Harrowmont were truly double-dealing – but she couldn’t shake the sense that she was about to tread into a web she didn’t understand.

“At least we know he’s effective, if the rumors speak true,” Zevran muttered.

Alistair sputtered. “I’m not saying you’re wrong,” he said hastily when they all looked at him. “But is that the kind of man we want to ally ourselves with?”

“Look at what we are up against,” Zevran returned.

Alistair sighed. “I take your point.”

“The prince is assuredly using us as well,” Leliana said. “Though it is true, he seems to play a subtler game.” Her eyes were narrowed in concentration. “He seems… less attached to the old dwarven traditions.”

“I don’t know that it’s our place to tell the dwarves how to live,” Nim said. “But…” She glanced from side to side. Even the glories of the Diamond Quarter had cracks, when you looked hard at them. The rigidity of the Shapers, the arrogance and infighting of the nobles, the gangs shaking down shopkeepers, the poor branded casteless down in Dust Town, condemned because they had the misfortune to be born to the wrong people: all of it troubled her. The surface world had its problems, too; perhaps the troubles here only seemed more stark to her because she came to them as a stranger. Still, she thought of the woman huddled in Dust Town with her casteless child, and dwarven ways seemed harsh indeed.

Sweat trickled down her neck. Nim felt all but wilted in Orzammar’s heat. “Well. We must have the dwarves by our side,” she said at last. “Let’s… let’s deliver these letters and then see.”

The others nodded, and fell in around her as she turned to make her way across the Diamond Quarter. “You might yet make a better king than either of them,” Leliana said to Alistair.

Alistair’s laugh was strained. “Ah, no thank you.”

“Even with all of us to help you?” Zevran asked brightly. “To kill your enemies and spy for you? What a shame.”


	18. Deep (Nim and Leliana)

Nim had lost track of how far they’d come into the Deep Roads. From the way her legs ached, it had to be have been miles, and hours upon hours, surely. But with no sun above to show her the way, with the light hardly changing around them, her sense of time stretched and faded, leaving her tromping on through the ceaseless twilight of the tunnels.

The Deep Roads were a strange place, and would have been marvelous if not for the ever-present dread of finding darkspawn around the next corner. Her head pounded with the dull awareness of ‘spawn somewhere, though not yet close, and Alistair’s pinched expression suggested he felt the same. The Deep Roads themselves soared above them, so high and finely carved that Nim could not fathom why dwarves, none of whom came higher than her shoulder, would build so high and broad. The scholar in her longed to stay, to pore over the carvings and runes and massive sculpture that still lined the halls. The mage in her wondered at the unflickering, ever-burning lights that still lined the passages.

This was no time to linger over intellectual curiosity, however, and so they pressed on, backtracking when they found the passages blocked and making their way through the rough passages the darkspawn had dug, tunneling away, leaving caverns full of dust and decay. And she was sure, even when the floor of the passage seemed smooth and level, that they were moving down, the passages tilting almost imperceptibly beneath their feet. How deep were they, now? How much deeper than Orzammar?

There was no telling.

Somewhere on the edges of Ortan Thaig, they decided to stop. For a rest, if not for the night; even Oghren had no idea how much time had passed. A section of undamaged dwarven-carved road seemed the safest place to stop for a time, and they pitched their tents to block out the light, putting stakes right down into the cracks between the stonework.

Nim crawled into her tent and lay in the warm, still air, too tired to attempt to do anything more. Yet sleep refused to come; when she closed her eyes, they drifted open again, and she stared at the canvas above her, listening to the others murmuring outside. How far they had come, and how much stone and earth lay heavy above them… and if they failed, they would be lost forever… the dwarves of Orzammar would shrug their shoulders and mutter about the topsiders who had disappeared in to the Deep Roads, no more… and the Blight might cover all, and then…

The tent flap moved, interrupting these morbid thoughts. Leliana crawled into the tent, unbuckling her armor and laying herself beside Nim with a sigh. Nim reached out a hand and Leliana caught it at once, their fingers twining together, and Nim exhaled, long and slow, trying to let the tension fade from her body.

“Are you well?” Leliana asked, her voice barely audible.

Nim took a breath and let it out again. “I hate it down here,” she murmured.

Leliana made a sympathetic noise and leaned her cheek on Nim’s shoulder.

“It already feels like we’ve been here forever, and…” Her voice caught in her throat; she had no words for how dark and ruinous it all was, these reminders of the civilization that had been, before the Blights.

“It is oppressive,” Leliana said softly. “The weight of the past, and the weight of the stone.”

“Yes! Yes, exactly.” Nim licked her lips. “And… they say all Grey Wardens come here, at the last, to end their days in fighting, and…”

“You need not,” Leliana said. She put her free arm around Nim, and kissed her cheek. “There are other ways.”

It seemed foolish to worry, when they might not live another day, or another week, but sometimes the short life Alistair had mentioned pressed on her. It seemed so unfair, when she had no asked for this.

“Or,” Leliana added, “if you chose to go, you need not go alone.”

“No,” Nim said, rolling over to hold Leliana tight. She said no more, as Leliana made soothing noises and stroked her hair, but deep down, she thought _no no no_ ; her own life might be given into the Wardens’ cause, like it or not, but when the hour came, she would not drag Leliana down into the darkness with her.


	19. Fallen

After all this – all the stone, and the darkness, and the endless stretching caverns, and the _spiders_ – they had chased a paragon’s ghost all the way through passages so deep that Nim could not fathom how many layers of rock lay above her.

Branka lived, or rather, had lived. She had fallen, in the end, beneath blade and lightning and stone fists. She lay dead on the floor of Caridin’s cavern now, terribly small for all the brilliance she had once had, for all the influence she had wielded, for all the cruelty she had dealt. Her slack face was pale, with the fury bled out of it, and she had the waxy cast of one who had lived in darkness for too long. She bore none of the creeping darkness of the darkspawn taint. She had fed others to the maw of the spawn, but held herself apart.

Looking down at her, Nim felt a pulse of anger in her chest and fingertips. Evidently she had not gotten over the horrors they had traversed to get here. People had counted on Branka, had faith in her, and she had sacrificed them: fed them to darkspawn, let them be taken and used and devoured, and for what? For nothing, as far as Nim could tell. She had cast off her followers as if they were obstacles to her goal, letting obsession carry her deeper into the darkness. Nim could not understand it, could not bend her mind to see through Branka’s eyes. She looked around at the rest of her people, who were, variously, examining the cavern, prodding at fallen golems, or talking to each other in low voices. She tried to picture herself willingly abandoning them to a fate like Hespith’s, and flinched. Even in her imagination, she couldn’t do it.

Perhaps that was the difference between a Paragon and an ordinary person. Or perhaps that had been something unique to Branka.

Oghren stood nearby, uncharacteristically silent, the heavy braids of his beard drooping. Nim could not tell whether he wept for the wife he’d lost years ago. She could not quite think what words of comfort might be appropriate to offer; she couldn’t yet say she was fond of the dwarf, but surely he deserved better than Branka’s contempt and abandonment. He’d lost his place in society for her even though she’d left him behind, only to be forced to raise his weapon against her in the end.

If he’d gone with her into the Deep Roads, he would have been lost long ago, like the rest.

Before Nim could think what to say, Oghren turned away, clomping off to a corner of the cavern. Perhaps it was best to let him alone for now; she could seek him out later, if he chose to accompany them back to the surface.

In the meantime, she was tired of toiling in darkness, and the thought of losing her friends down here made her heart quake. She would be mightily glad to see the sky again.

They left Branka where she fell, among the stones, the golems, and the shattered Anvil.


	20. Storm (Nim and Leliana)

The storm blew up while they made their way along the shores of Lake Calenhad. One moment, it seemed, the sky was clear except for a dark scudding line at the horizon, and the next, the sky had gone black and water poured from the heavens.

Leliana sighed, clutching her cloak tighter around herself, although it was poor protection against rain this heavy. Her bow and lute case bumped against her back. She would have to check both later to make sure the damp had not harmed the strings.

“Shelter!” Oghren called over the din of the rain. He barreled ahead, pointing toward a cluster of rocks rising away from the lake. “Mebbe a cave, like as not…”

The rocks did not look prepossessing to Leliana, but their party was too far from any settlement to have hope of finding a roof and walls, so she supposed it was better than nothing.

Nim nodded to Oghren’s call, doubtless making the same calculation. She turned her steps toward the rocks, head down against the wind that spattered rain into their eyes. Leliana pulled down her hood in a vain attempt to shield herself, and followed. The others did the same, Sten silently providing a supporting arm to Wynne as they left the path and ground rose rougher underfoot. A dark-furred wolf padded past Leliana, and for a moment she envied Morrigan the ability to change to a form that could shake off the clinging rain.

They had only plodded a short distance toward the rocks, however, before Alistair raised a warning arm and shouted, “Darkspawn!”

Leliana stopped with a jerk and looked up, to see the first hurlock archers appearing over the rocks – and no other cover within running distance. Cursing, she fumbled for her bow. Both dog and wolf bounded ahead with teeth bared, while Zevran ran past Leliana, daggers already in his hands.

But Nim planted herself squarely in the path, shouting, “Stand back!” in a voice louder than Leliana had ever heard her speak. Alistair and Sten both glanced at her in surprise, but hesitated as she bade, their steps dragging. Morrigan skidded to a halt, and the mabari proved his wit by halting as well, though he looked back at his mistress with a questioning whine.

Nim raised her arms, her long hands tracing complex patterns in the air. Leliana blinked, as violet trails began to follow Nim’s fingers. Was it only a trick of the light?  

No, for Nim flung her hands open, as thunder rumbled in the clouds above, and then lightning burst out of the sky: first a single bolt that struck a hurlock where he stood, and then an entire cloud of crackling white lightning, encompassing the entire cluster of rocks. Thunder rattled with each strike, so loud that Leliana could only barely hear the screeches of the darkspawn. The genlocks who fled from the tempest’s orbit quickly met their end to at the blades of Alistair, Sten, Zevran, and Oghren, while gales of twisting lightning fell for what felt like an eternity.

When it was done, the air still tingled, and Leliana felt her hair trying to rise. The rocks stood scorched and battered, and the sound of falling rain felt like silence in comparison to the barrage of thunder.

“Well,” Alistair said. “No more darkspawn.”

Nim turned back toward them, to find them all staring at her. She flushed but said, “Right, then, let’s find ourselves some shelter.”

There _was_ a cave there, as it happened, not much more than a nook among the rocks, but enough to keep the rain off and allow them to build a tiny fire. As they shook water from their cloaks and settled themselves, Nim retreated to the deepest point of the cave.

Puzzled, Leliana made her way to Nim’s side. “That was... impressive,” she murmured. She had seen Nim call lightning many times before, single bolts flung from her hands against their attackers, but nothing like the storm she had just summoned.

 Nim ducked her head, a gesture Leliana knew by now as retreat, or embarrassment. “I don’t often,” NIm said in a low voice. “But it was so easy, with the weather, and with a group of them there…” She spread her hands, hitching her shoulders.

Leliana wrapped her arms around Nim and tucked her head against Nim’s shoulder. “Don’t regret a thing. It was marvelous! And quite effective.”

Nim laughed softly, relaxing a trifle, and tilting herself toward Leliana. “It’s silly,” she said, her voice low. “I know you’ve seen me use magic, but... they always told us people feared magic, and rightly, so... I don’t always show all that I can do.”

Leliana hugged Nim tighter, biting her lip. She hated to see Nim turn so shy and uncertain of herself, when her intelligence and quiet strength were palpable. Too much of what people thought about magic was commentary, not the Chant itself. Leliana had sung it enough times to know. People turned the Chant to their own ends, closing their eyes to so many wondrous people closed out by their rigidity.

“Your magic does not frighten me,” she said at last. “You are as the Maker made you.”

Nim said nothing, but rested her cheek against Leliana’s hair. Around them, the cave gradually warmed, the rest of their party choosing their own seats to wait out the storm. None looked askance at Nim, who relaxed, bit by bit, in Leliana’s arms. Leliana settled closer, humming a snatch of tune, with the rain a steady drumbeat outside.


	21. Forms and Changes (Nim and Morrigan)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nim and Morrigan gradually find friendship.

“You allow the others to call you Nim, though ‘tis not your full name,” Morrigan said one day, in her usual blunt way. This time, Nim did not know quite what Morrigan was getting at.

“Yes?” she said cautiously. “I don’t mind.”

“Do you not?” Morrigan’s golden gaze was piercing, perhaps sharper than usual, and Nim flushed a little under the scrutiny, averting her eyes. She could not make out why Morrigan would care what the others called her.

“I was always Nimuë in the tower, and it’s not that I dislike it…”

“’Tis a fine name,” Morrigan put in.

“Er, thank you.” It was rather a romantic name, she supposed, and so a clue to what sort of person her mother had been, to name her so. Only a small clue, but still. “I don’t recall who started calling me Nim...” That was a lie; she quite clearly remembered it had been Alistair. He had just come out with it one evening while building up the fire, off-handedly. He probably hadn’t even realized he was calling her something out of the ordinary. Mentioning Alistair to Morrigan, however, would only set off her disapproval, so Nim thought it best not to. “... but I like it. The Circle tended to be formal, you know. Half the enchanters didn’t use my name at all, only called me _apprentice_ , and I only had a few friends, so...” She shrugged, not sure how to say this, and certain Morrigan would think her foolish for caring about whether other people liked her. “... having a nickname makes it feel as though we are friends.”

She bit her lip, waiting for Morrigan to say something scornful, but Morrigan only said, “Hm. I see.”

Nim stole a glance at her, and found Morrigan looking thoughtful rather than haughty. Nim hesitated, wondering what to say next.

“If you prefer the short name, I shall of course call you that as well,” Morrigan said abruptly.

“No, I – I like them both,” Nim said, bewildered.

“All the short versions of _Morrigan_ sound abominable, however.”

“Morri?” Nim suggested.

Morrigan wrinkled her nose.

“No, you’re quite right,” Nim agreed hastily. “You are... Morrigan, indisputably.”

Morrigan snorted, but she looked rather pleased, even so.

#

“No one has given me gifts before,” Morrigan said, turning the mirror in her hand so that the gold and glass and crystals sparkled in the light. Delicately, she rubbed at a smudge on the glass with the edge of her skirt. Nim smiled to herself, enjoying Morrigan’s fascination with the little bit of vanity.

A moment later, Morrigan tore her attention from the mirror and stared at Nim with owl-like eyes. “But then, you give everyone gifts.”

“I.. well. I like making my friends happy,” Nim admitted, scraping at the ground with the toe of her boot. “Even if it’s only for a little while.”

“That is… kind,” Morrigan said, as if tasting something unfamiliar. “If not, perhaps, the best use of your time, o busy Warden.”

Nim’s cheeks heated, but she shook her head. “We are carrrying around _bags_ of money. We can easily spend a little on a trifle here or there. Besides, it keeps up morale.” Or so Leliana always said, cheerfully justifying every purchase from new boots to imported tea and chocolates with the need to improve morale. Nim had to admit that Leliana was right, more than half the time, and even Sten did not balk at the extra comforts so long as they included a box of cookies.

By the way the corner of Morrigan’s mouth crooked up, she was not falling for the line. “Well. Anything for the cause,” she said, dry as dust. She sounded more amused than annoyed, however.

Nim waited for a moment, as Morrigan fell back into a reverie over the mirror, and then said, “Well, it was my pleasure. I’m glad you like it.” Nim said.

“Thank you,” Morrigan said as Nim turned to go. Abruptly, again, and yet quietly, the words sounding strange out of her mouth.

“You’re welcome,” Nim said, just as softly.

#

Nim gripped her staff hard and stared at Flemeth, trying to divine intent from that seamed face and ancient eyes. She had come here as Morrigan bade – with Alistair and Leliana and Wynne at her side, prepared for a confrontation, but hoping for an explanation. She owed Flemeth her life, after all. She would rather not attack one who had aided her out of hand, even assuming she could prevail over Flemeth’s likely power and knowledge.

So she had come to ask for truth, to hear from Flemeth’s own mouth whether she had designs on her daughter’s life and mind. But Flemeth gave her nothing: refused to answer any question straight, and rather offered a bargain. Nim could accept her word and take the book and leave the cottage in the wilds, leaving Flemeth behind, alive and well and free.

If she did so, she would have to lie to Morrigan’s face, promising her a false safety. Nim was not sure she could bring herself to do that. She did not always _like_ Morrigan, exactly – she could be temperamental, and abrasive, and occasionally downright cruel – but she had also been true, brave and intelligent, and they would have been lost without her half a dozen times over. Even if she were the worst person in Ferelden, she deserved better than to be taken to extend another’s long life. And Flemeth promised nothing, even suggested she might visit Morrigan later.

Nim narrowed her eyes, hoping that she could discern anything at all about Flemeth’s intentions. Reaching out with her other senses, she felt... power, coiled and banked, a solid bulwark she could not penetrate. Before her, she saw only Flemeth’s seamed, lined face, gray hair and a rough homespun dress.

Flemeth’s eyes sparkled, clear and gray, wells of boundless depth. Flemeth crooked a fox’s smile at her, and gave away nothing.

If Nim had had anything, any inkling at all that she could trust Flemeth’s promise, she might have taken the offer.

“I think not,” she said instead, and her hand tightened on her staff. At the corner of her eye, she saw Alistair and Leliana brace.

Flemeth’s smile only deepened, lines carving heavier around her mouth. “Ah well,” she said. “It seems Morrigan has chosen well after all.”

Then she shrugged off her body as one might a cloak, and the wind of her unfurling wings nearly knocked Nim flat.

#

After, they limped back to camp, sore and bruised. The grimoire in Nim’s pack felt heavier than it had any right to, and the dragon’s roar still rang in her ears. They went quietly; Alistair was too unnerved for jokes, and Wynne and Leliana moved wearily, with slumped shoulders. For her part, Nim was lost in thought. Flemeth’s transformation had shocked her only in those first moments. She had seen enough of Morrigan’s other forms to realize she must have learned the art somewhere. But a _dragon_ …

Flemeth was more than she seemed. Nim had begun realizing that when she woke in the lonely cabin, confused but healed of her wounds. Morrigan’s tales of her mother had Nim her more, but it all seemed no more than vapor and legend, wrapped around something all the more potent for going unseen.

“Truly?” Morrigan said as Nim related their encounter with Flemeth. She drew in a shuddering breath and let it out, the line of her shoulders softening. Her golden eyes rested avidly on the battered grimoire, and her fingers twitched toward it even before Nim had quite offered it up.

Nim hesitated, a greedy little seed in her heart clamoring to keep the tome for herself. What wonders might she learn from it? But she ruthlessly rooted out the thought and held out the grimoire with both hands.

“Flemeth’s grimoire,” Morrigan murmured. “All her secrets...” In spite of her eagerness, she hesitated before taking the book into her hands. “Thank you,” she added, her voice hushed. “I... had not thought to find such an... ally.”

“We _are_ friends,” Nim said. “I asked her if it was true, what you had found, and she would not answer. I would not betray you so.”

Morrigan nodded, but a shadow crossed her face. Her full lips compressed, and she held the grimoire against her chest.

“I’ll… leave you to your studies,” Nim said, feeling awkward.

“’Twould be best,” Morrigan said, and then, as Nim turned away: “I shall tell you, if I find aught of interest.”

“Thank you,” Nim said, hoping she did not seem too eager.

“Is there,” Morrigan said, and stopped. Nim turned back to face her, drawn by the other woman’s uncharacteristic hesitation. Morrigan wet her lips, and said, “You have done me a great service. Is there aught I might do for you in return?”

“You stand by my side every day,” Nim said.

Morrigan’s face crimped and she shook her head. “We fight together. ‘Tis not... sufficient.”

Nim hesitated, as an idea occurred to her. “Would you mind, perhaps, teaching me how you change shape? Sometime?” She envied Morrigan her malleable form sometimes, and she remembered, with an odd longing, how easy it had been to change herself in the Sloth demon’s trap.

Morrigan’s face cleared, looking quite relieved. “Of course. Let us start tomorrow?”

“Whenever you like,” Nim said, trying not to seem too eager. Morrigan would want to spend time studying the grimoire, of course.

Morrigan’s lips twitched. “Tomorrow,” she repeated, and, as Nim turned again to go, added, “Thank you.”


	22. Escape (Leliana, Zevran, Anora, Morrigan, Nim)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This installment is longer; I probably could have posted it as a standalone, but here is where it fits into the narrative.

Leliana heard shouting as they hurried down the corridors of the Arl’s estate, their royal charge in tow, and all five of them skidded to a halt.

“They know we’re here,” Nim said, her voice tight. She glanced at Leliana, already reaching for her staff. “Get her Highness out of here.”

“You’re not staying,” Leliana protested, her mind whirling. What had started as a simple infiltration had become anything but. Magic, prisoners, Arl Howe himself lying dead in his own dungeon... and now this.

“It’s us they’re looking for.” Nim circled her finger in the air, indicating Alistair and herself. “The three of you can get out.”

“And it’s you we can’t lose!” Leliana exclaimed. “You are both needed to fight the Blight!”

Nim turned toward her, grey eyes intent. “We’re not the only ones any more. And you can find us afterward. But now you need to get her out.”

For a moment, Leliana cursed the senior Warden they’d found in the dungeon, who’d doubtless already made his escape. If only he’d stayed with them, or –

“There are a great many massing in the front hall,” reported Zevran, who had slipped ahead to listen at the door.

“Nim’s right,” Alistair said, his expression grim. “You’ve got to go.”

Leliana breathed out a curse and whirled. Zevran was already guiding Anora back down the corridor. “The way we came in, I think,” he said as she caught up with them.

Leliana cast one look behind, but Alistair and Nim had already disappeared down the hallway. “Yes, of course,” she bit out, and the three of them made their way toward the garden entrance.

They went as swiftly as they dared, but passed no guards. The house guards must have either fled, or joined the attackers at the front entrance. It was all too eerily quiet. Leliana could not help but feel that they should be able to hear the skirmish at the front of the house. Unless it was over already...

No. She must focus on the task at hand, or Nim and Alistair’s courage would be for nothing. Leliana set her teeth and cast her thoughts ahead, to their impending escape, rather than to the fate of their companions.

The door stood unlocked, making their passage out of the house easy enough. A guard in Loghain’s livery stood in the path between the estate’s garden and the street, however. Anora flinched at the sight of him, her shoulders hunching in her borrowed armor.

That was no way to deal with this. They all still wore stolen guardsmen’s armor, and the helm Anora wore shaded her face and concealed her hair. Their best strategy was the oldest one: move with confidence, as if you had every right to be where you were, and hope no one looked too closely. Leliana nudged Anora with an elbow. Anora glanced at her, a little wild around the eyes. Leliana shook her head briefly and drew herself up, squaring her shoulders. Anora swallowed and followed Leliana’s example, settling herself into the mien of a guard.

Once Leliana was satisfied with their respective postures, she went out past the guard, her chin lifted, emulating the swagger of a soldier Loghain’s man caught her eye as she passed, but spared her only a nod. His eyes drifted back to the street, oblivious to their real identity. Zevran and Anora followed, and Leliana kept walking, looking resolutely forward, all the while straining her ears for any cry from the guard.

But none ensued. They strode down the street as if they had business to undertake, and Leliana counted out a quarter-mile in her head before she stepped into an alley and drew Anora in after her.

“You’d better have played us true, Your Majesty,” Zevran said, stepping in after them and boxing the queen between the two of them in the narrow space. His eyes flicked to Leliana’s, and she saw her own grim mood mirrored there.

“I swear to you, I haven’t betrayed you.” Anora was pale, her eyes darting from one of them to the other. “I have no more wish to see them harmed than you do.”

“We follow the Wardens,” Leliana told her firmly. She made her voice harsh, masking how close to tears she was. This was a bard’s game, and it was always better to play those when your heart was not committed. “If you can help us, so much the better, but our loyalty is not to you.”

Anora took a breath and visibly settled herself, putting on composure like a mask. “I understand that,” she said. “I will help if I can. They will be taking them to Fort Drakon. I heard my father’s lieutenant, Ser Cauthrien, in the hall.”

“And would she kill them out of hand?” Leliana pressed. It could already be too late. Nim had seemed confident, but there was no telling – she bit back the fear.

Anora shook her head. “I think not. Cauthrien is loyal to my father, but fair and honorable. She’ll want to see them tried, not slaughtered.”

“That makes little enough difference when the trial is rigged,” Zevran said, glancing toward the street. “Fort Drakon, eh?” He clicked his tongue. “That will not be easy to crack.”

It would not, indeed. Leliana pressed her lips together, her mind racing. “Let us return to the Arl. I have an idea or two.”

#

“You can’t be serious,” Morrigan said when Leliana told her the plan she had begun to piece together.

“I am quite serious, I assure you.”

“You want _me_ to impersonate a _Chantry sister_.”

“It’s just a robe,” Leliana said. “It will hardly hamper you at all. The guards should admit two Chantry sisters easily enough. A pious mission to the prisoners, that is all. We shall appear utterly innocuous.” Once inside the fort, she should be able to find a bow easily enough, and Morrigan was lethal without a weapon in her hands at all.

Morrigan pursed her lips. Leliana could see her ticking off their other companions in her head. None of the men would serve this particular scheme as well; Sten and Oghren looked entirely too bellicose, even out of armor. Zevran might more easily play the lay brother, but Leliana would not lay coin on his ability to avoid being lewd. They could hardly march into Fort Drakon with a golem.

“Why not Wynne?” Morrigan asked. “Surely an aged sister would appear even less threatening.”

That was true, and Leliana had thought of it – but she worried for Wynne’s health. If matters did go wrong, Leliana thought she and Morrigan had a better chance of both escaping alive. She did not say so, however. Instead she widened her eyes innocently. “Oh, I daresay you are right! Shall I ask her instead, then? I only thought you would want to part of this.”

Morrigan snorted, her eyes narrowing. “Oh, very well. As we began together, ‘tis appropriate we continue, I suppose.”

The plan was decided on – perhaps because the only real alternative suggested was to send an armed party to the door. _That_ plan would stand in reserve against the failure of this one, and Leliana and Morrigan soon approached the gate of Fort Drakon dressed in habits surreptitiously taken from the Chantry’s vestuary. _Borrowed_ , Leliana told herself, sending a silent prayer for the Maker’s forgiveness. Andraste would understand, surely, that desperate times called for measures that were not entirely aboveboard. Leliana could not imagine that leading a slave rebellion had been entirely clean work.

“’Twill never succeed,” Morrigan murmured.

She was unusually pale, in fact, and moved stiffly in her sister’s robes. Obscurely, Leliana found Morrigan’s discomfiture forced her to be calm, and reassure. For all of Morrigan’s power, this was Leliana’s plan. Stealth, deception, and subterfuge – a bard’s methods.

“Just let me do the talking,” she replied.

It was a near thing. The first guards grumbled, but quailed when Leliana dropped to her knees, raising her eyes in fervent, radiant prayer. Within, they passed through the fort unquestioned until they encountered a sergeant sharper than the rest, but even here Leliana found herself able to talk the woman away from her post for a crucial moment.

“Well done,” Morrigan whispered, half grudgingly.

 _The Maker blesses us_ , Leliana thought, but she knew by now better than to say it aloud. There was no sense in risking Morrigan betraying them with a scoff.

The deeper they penetrated into the fortress, the more out of place they were. Still, Leliana tried to maintain a placid, prayerful expression, and not move too quickly, as if she actually had a right to be where she was.

She almost thought they would get away with it – blessed by the Maker indeed – until a pair of guards turned the corner in front of them and stiffened in surprise. Leliana reached for her bow, but Morrigan had the two encased in ice before she’d fully drawn. Startled by the spray of cold passing her cheek, Leliana glanced at her companion. From the set of Morrigan’s jaw, she was not the only one who felt her nerves balance on the edge of a blade.

“Let us make haste,” Morrigan suggested, stepping delicately around the frozen guards.

Leliana nodded in agreement. They proceeded through the rest of the corridors more swiftly, while Leliana strained her ears to catch any distant outcry or sound of feet.

At last they reached the inner prison ward. Anora had thought Nim and Alistair would be held here, away from the common lot of prisoners. Hoping the queen was correct, Leliana bent to the lock, her picks already in hand, while Morrigan stood watch, tense as a bent branch.

The lock gave after a few quiet, torturous moments. Beyond, they found themselves hurrying through a nest of drab corridors, and finally spied familiar faces within a spare cell. Nim paced while Alistair sat, back against the wall. He spotted them first, mouth falling open in shock, and then Nim whirled toward them.

Her face lit up. Her mouth opened, only to close as she visibly restrained herself from calling out. She met Leliana at the grate, and they briefly pressed their hands together between the bars.

“I knew you’d come,” she said softly, while Leliana turned her attention to the lock.

She waited while the Leliana concentrated, probing at the lock. It took a few seconds until the mechanism gave, and then Leliana looked up to meet Nim’s gaze while the door swung free. She seemed none the worse for wear, hardly even a bruise showing on her face, though her jaw was tight with worry. The sight of her filled Leliana with an inexpressible relief, casting away a fear she hadn’t allowed herself to truly feel since she had left Nim behind.

“Of course,” she replied, belatedly.

Nim smiled, just a small curve of her lips, before they turned to the business of completing the escape.

#

Only later – after escaping the fortress far more easily than they had entered it, with Alistair to carve a path and Nim to clear their way in lightning and fire – and after reuniting with the rest of their party and dodging through Denerim’s back alleys and winding streets, back to the Arl of Redcliffe’s estate for baths and food and muted celebration –

Only then did Leliana take Nim’s face in both hands, in the privacy of the room they shared, and kiss her on the forehead, on both cheeks, and finally on the lips. “I feared I would not see you again,” she whispered, daring now to give voice to her fear.

Nim let out a breath, her shoulders drooping. “I feared the same. Not that I thought you couldn’t manage,” she added hastily, “and of course I knew you’d come for me if you could, but if anything should go wrong...”

Leliana kissed her, right over one closed eye. Nim shivered.

“If it had been very much longer, we would have tried to escape on our own,” she said.

“You did not have to,” Leliana replied, with another kiss over the other eye.

Nim smiled, eyes still closed, and tilted her head to kiss Leliana back. “I know.”

Leliana wrapped her arms around her, dropping her head to Nim’s shoulder, and breathed in the scent of her skin and hair. Clean and smelling faintly of lavender, with nothing of the musty tang of the cell in it. This had been a very near thing, though, even with all the risks they had run before. “The Maker has smiled upon us.”

“I hope he continues to,” Nim said, hugging Leliana back. When Leliana released her, slowly, Nim sighed and dropped onto the nearest side of the bed without even taking off her belt.

Leliana watched her for a moment, her fingers fidgeting at the coverlet and a frown creasing her face. Clearly exhausted, but too full of restless worry to give in to it. Leliana circled to the other side of the bed and lay down herself. They lay in silence for a time, while Leliana gently combed her fingers through Nim’s hair, hoping it might help soothe her.

Nim grew quieter after a time, and Leliana might have thought she slept, except that her eyes were still half-open, a vertical line of concentration between her brows.

“Leliana, what do you think of the queen?” she asked after a while.

Leliana’s fingers stilled. Anora had greeted the returned Wardens with congratulations on their freedom, most politely, and had discreetly retired to her own rooms. Out of her brief imprisonment, and out of her borrowed armor, she had been calm and self-possessed, not a hair of her golden braids out of place. “She knows how to play the Game,” she said. A gut assessment, born of old skills that Leliana had not lost entirely, after all.

“What game?” Nim asked.

Leliana laughed a little. “The Game, dear heart. The game of politics, of court, of status in society. Anora is the daughter of a warrior, but I wager she was raised to make the court her battlefield.”

Nim’s frown deepened. “Do you mean we can’t trust her?”

“Knowing the Game is not a bad thing,” Leliana replied. “I know it, myself.”

“Hmm.”

Leliana thought again of the queen’s upright, perfect performance as gracious lady, and of how she had pulled herself together in the alley from her moment of panic. “Anora is clearly intelligent,” she said. “Rumor says hers were the hands on the reins of power while the king was alive.”

“I met Cailan,” Nim said softly.

“Oh?” Leliana asked, curious. Nim had not talked much about this encounter.

Nim shrugged a shoulder. “It was at Ostagar, when I first arrived. He seemed... very enthusiastic about the battle.”

Leliana winced at that. “Ah.”

“I didn’t know how to take it at the time. In hindsight, his attitude does seem foolish.” Nim pursed her lips. “Loghain is not all wrong.”

“And yet he did betray the king.”

“And hating the Wardens won’t stop the Blight.” Nim sighed. “I know so little of him, really, or of any of this... game. Anora is his daughter. I thought she might be the key to knowing his mind, or... something. It seems better to have her on our side, but I don’t know that she would turn on him so.”

Leliana considered, pressing her tongue against her teeth. “She has been raised to power all her life,” she said after a moment. “But she has also had to depend on others for that power. Her father, and then her husband. Even now, she has no blood claim to the throne. She rules only as the late king’s wife, and under her father’s regency.”

“I wonder how she feels about that,” Nim murmured.

“Were I she, it might chafe,” Leliana said.

“Mm,” Nim said. “We will have to decide how to go on with her.”

“Tomorrow,” Leliana suggested.

“Mm,” Nim agreed, her eyes sliding closed.

Leliana waited until she was sure Nim had finally lapsed into sleep, and then kissed her once more on the cheek. She was free and safe, at least, and they could find the next steps in this game together.


	23. Quandary (Nim, Alistair, and company)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nim and the others debate their plan for the Landsmeet.

Once they’d escaped from Fort Drakon, Nim would have expected the Arl to tell them what to do. His knowledge of politics was a good share of the reason they were working together, after all. And the Arl did have a plan, certainly. But Nim listened to him, gesturing elegantly in his finery, and looked out of the corner of her eye at Alistair, and found him with his eyes anxiously fixed on her, and her stomach sank.

She spoke with Anora, too. The queen was cool and collected, sipping tea in her sitting room with no trace of the previous day’s fear. Yet her eyes, too, lingered on Nim speculatively, and Nim’s stomach tightened into a knot.

Nim could feel battle lines being drawn within the estate, the Arl and the queen positioned on either side of the upper level, sending messengers back and forth with veiled barbs beneath the civilityMeanwhile, Alistair loomed around behind Nim like a large unhappy shadow. It felt just like Orzammar, only everything was hidden behind courtly garb and manners instead of brawling right out in the stone streets.

It hardly seemed as though she, a mage and a Warden, ought to be the one deciding Fereldan’s fate, but everyone seemed to be looking to her to do it. Even Riordan had been no help, disappearing into the city and offering no real counsel.

For lack of any better idea what to do, Nim gathered her companions in her own room, away from the curious ears of the servants. Most of her companions, at least. Shale vocally did not care, and Oghren had fallen asleep snoring in a corner. At least Oscar would adore her no matter what she chose.

“Well,” Nim said, feeling absurd at the front of the room. “I’m sure you all know that Eamon means to make Alistair king.”

Morrigan scoffed, and Alistair let out a long, noisy sigh.

“Meanwhile, I’ve also talked to Anora, and she has... spoken much of her accomplishments as queen.” Nim frowned, biting her lip. Eamon had been rather more dismissive of these accomplishments, and she did not know whose word to trust.

“She is sounding us out for support,” Leliana said with easy certainty.

“I don’t actually know what the laws of succession are,” Nim admitted. “It was not exactly addressed in the tower.” There were books on the history and laws of Ferelden and Orlais, of course, but she had always preferred the arcane sections of the library.

Zevran snorted. “Laws matter little. This is politics. Whoever can secure the most support prevails.”

Nim grimaced. She had a sinking feeling he was right.

“In fact, if I recall Ferelden’s laws, the Landsmeet decides,” Leliana said. “But they have not chosen outside the Theirin line in generations.” She spread her hands with a tiny shrug.

“I don’t know if I even count as part of the Theirin line,” Alistair protested.

“Alistair, your face makes the case for you,” Leliana said gently.

Alistair subsided, slouching in his seat.

“Are there no other possibilities?” Nim asked.

Leliana shrugged again. “The highest ranking nobles are the Teyrnir of Highever and Gwaren. The Couslands are destroyed, alas, Arl Howe saw to that, and the other is Loghain himself. Eamon is the most eminent of the Arls, and clearly has no wish to put himself forward as king.”

Nim nodded, slowly. “What do you all think of Anora?” She glanced around the room, hoping for insight.

Sten merely grunted. Alistair shrugged. Morrigan said, “She seems intelligent enough.”

“She is no fool,” Zevran agreed. “Which could make her as easily a spy for her father. One can never be sure.”

“Eamon seems to think we shouldn’t trust her,” Nim said doubtfully. She wanted to like Anora, rather by instinct; Anora was cool and quiet in ways that gave her an odd sense of kinship. She could hardly blame Anora for placing too much faith in her own father. But then again, Nim was not sure her own instincts could be trusted, either.

“Yes, but look at what he says, and does not say,” Leliana replied. “He thinks Alistair will learn to be king. Well and good, but mark my words, Eamon means to be the teacher.”

“And the power behind the throne,” Zevran added, tossing his dagger and catching it mid-air.

“Eamon is not above the fray,” Leliana said, with a nod. “He only pretends to be.”

“Oh,” Nim murmured, feeling foolish. What they said made perfect sense, and felt like a key turning in a lock, as the thing that had been unsettling her every time she spoke to the Arl fell into place.

“Eamon’s a good man,” Alistair protested. “He was the king’s uncle, and he knows far more about running the kingdom than we do.”

“And he would have you be king,” Morrigan reminded him with asperity.

Alistair wilted, frowning.

“Why should we not support Anora?” Morrigan added. “Alistair is neither suited to the role nor wants it, and she already handles the realm’s affairs. If she is a sensible woman, as she appears to be, ‘twill be no difficulty to come to an arrangement with her.”

Wynne spoke up for the first time. “People can surprise you. I think Ferelden could do worse than to have a brave, kind, and compassionate king.”

Morrigan rolled her eyes. Alistair, blushing furiously, said, “All the same, isn’t there, like... stuff... that a king would need to know? And doesn’t Anora already know it?”

“One would presume,” Leliana said. “She and Eamon agree on one thing, that she managed many of the affairs of state while Cailan lived.”

“And yet she knew nothing of this scheme in the alienage,” Zevran said. “She could not keep that power in her grasp with Loghain and Howe against her. So she may not be as skilled as she claims, after all.”

“Which is it?” Morrigan asked with arched eyebrows. “Is she a clever spy, or a weak ruler?”

Zevran laughed. “Who can say? Both, or neither. Either way, we take a chance.”

Nim rubbed her forehead with a sigh. This was getting so complicated. She didn’t truly think Alistair would be such a bad king – but she sympathized with Anora – but Zev raised a good point, and besides, could they really trust Anora? It was all giving her a headache. “What do you think, Sten?” she asked, for lack of any better ideas.

He remained silent for a moment, and she thought perhaps he was not going to speak at all. Then he spoke, abruptly. “This talk of bloodlines is absurd. A wise leader’s child may not be suited to lead. It is better to set each child tasks suited to their abilities.”

“No doubt,” Nim said cautiously, peering at him with curiosity. Sten had been notably taciturn on the subject of qunari government in the past.

“This Anora has some skill at rule, at least. But it is foolishness to have one govern all. Better two, or three, each to lead their own.”

“Their own?” Nim asked, trying to follow.

Sten sighed, in the way he did when he thought they were bungling hopelessly, or failing to understand something that should be obvious to a small child. “In the Qun, one leads the Antaam – you would say our army – another governs the merchants and craftsmen and laborers, and another the... priests. Body, mind, soul.”

“Oh, come now, Sten,” Alistair put in. “You can’t possibly think I’d be a suitable army leader.”

Sten shot him a dark look under his brows. “Indeed.”

Alistair looked as though he weren’t quite sure whether to be pleased or insulted.

“Sten makes an excellent point,” Leliana said. “Perhaps joint rule would be better.”

“Wait,” Alistair said. “What are you saying?”

“You have the Theirin blood,” Leliana said. “Which, I am sorry, Sten, but humans do care about such things. And besides, you are a Grey Warden, and a skilled warrior. And then you have Anora, who is experienced in government, a tie to the last king, and well enough liked among the people.”

“The best of both worlds,” Nim murmured, considering. Was this a solution, or just another complication? It might just be the thing to resolve their troubles.

Leliana nodded. “Precisely.”

“No! Not the best of both worlds! Then we’d have to get _married_ , wouldn’t we?”

“You’d make a most attractive couple,” Zevran offered. Morrigan snorted.

“Doesn’t anyone care how I feel about this?” Alistair demanded. “Or her? Who said she wanted to marry again, anyway?”

“Of course I care,” Nim replied. She swallowed. The elegance of the solution appealed to her, but these were real people’s lives and hearts at stake. Nervously, she folded the hem of her robe into pleats, and then smoothed them out again. “I’m just trying to think what’s best for the kingdom. And against the Blight.”

Alistair fell silent, his expression perilously close to a pout.

Zevran shrugged. “The Blight is surely our main problem.”

“If you would consider it,” Leliana added, with a glance in Alistair’s direction, “such an arrangement might end the civil war, and then Ferelden could face the Blight united.”

Alistair wrinkled his nose, scrunching down in his chair.

“I don’t want to force anyone into anything,” Nim said hastily. “But we have to have something to put before the Landsmeet, and we’d surely do better with both Anora’s and Eamon’s support.”

Alistair made a face. Everyone looked toward him with various degrees of curiosity and expectation; Nim could only feel relief that those gazes weren’t directed at her, for once. “I’ll think about it,” he said.

“That’s all I can ask,” Nim said.

Leliana nodded, her eyes sharp and thoughtful. “There are a few days before we must decide.”

Nim and Alistair both winced. “Let me think about it,” he repeated.

Their gathering broke up, most of their companions drifting out the door, talking amongst themselves. Alistair caught Nim’s sleeve. “Do you really think that – me and Anora – would be a good idea?” he asked in a low voice.

He was looking at her earnestly, as if she had some kind of insight he didn’t. Nim spread her hands, helplessly. “Do you think it wouldn’t be?” _Would it really be as bad as all that?_ She didn’t ask. It seemed rude, too harsh, even though Alistair’s helpless expression reminded her a little of Jowan, begging for her help.

His teeth worried at his lower lip. “I don’t know. I just... gah.”

“I know it’s not anything you were prepared for.”

“No, but...” he dropped his hand from her sleeve, staring into space. “I’d thought... a little... about being king, since Ostagar. Not about marriage, or the queen, or anything like that. But...” He grimaced. “I wasn’t entirely surprised when Eamon said I should be king.”

“It wouldn’t have to be forever,” she suggested hesitantly. “Once the Blight is over... later... Something else might be arranged. An abdication, perhaps, or...”

He wrinkled his nose. “I wouldn’t want to leave the kingdom in the lurch. And if I’m going to do this, I don’t want to be just a figurehead, either. I just... don’t know if it’s a good idea.”

Nim sighed. “I don’t want to make you do anything you don’t want to. But if you’re set against it, we could simply cast our lot with Anora.”

“I don’t know about _set_ ,” Alistair replied, frowning into the distance.

Nim waited, but no more seemed to be forthcoming. She said slowly, “I think that if you’re taking the king’s duties this seriously, you’d not be a bad king at all.”

Alistair grimaced again, but didn’t deny her claims. “I think... I need to talk to Anora,” he said finally.

“That’s a good idea,” Nim said, relieved. So much responsibility rested on his shoulders and hers, it was really best that the two of them reach an understanding. “I hope we can trust her, but if you think we can’t...” At the bleak expression on Alistair’s face, she added hastily, “We’ll figure it out, Alistair. No matter what.”

“Thanks,” he muttered.

Nim patted him on the shoulder, awkwardly. “Whatever anyone else says, I think you’d lead the kingdom’s armies well. The rest can be sorted out in time.”

“I suppose we might always die fighting the Archdemon before it came to that,” Alistair said.

Nim wrinkled her nose and elbowed him in the side. “You’re so cheerful.”

He smiled for the first time in an hour, though even the smile had a melancholy edge to it. “That’s what I’m here for.”

Nim sighed. It seemed all too certain that, whatever bold plans they tried to make, they’d be dead within weeks, if not days.

“Hey.” Alistair nudged her arm. “Whatever else happens, we’ll stick together. It’s not all on you.”

He was looking at her earnestly, and with more than a little concern. Nim managed to muster up a smile, a little heartened. “Of course,” she said. “Together.”

They had held their own all the way from Ostagar, after all. They’d come so far; surely they could manage the Landsmeet as well.


End file.
